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The Foreign
Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) has approved the proposal of Broadcast
Worldwide to issue fresh equity shares to a Mauritius-based company,
Crombie International Ltd, to bring in fresh investment. Broadcast
Worldwide, which runs the TARA (Television Aimed at Regional Audiences)
group of regional channels, had applied to FIPB for issue of 752,000
fresh equity shares amounting to around Rs 3.6 crore ($0.8 million)
to Crombie International Ltd.
The issue of
shares to Crombie would enable Broadcast Worldwide to carry on the
existing activities of re-transmitting and broadcasting four TV
channels in digital mode through Thaicom-3 satellite in four Indian
languages " Bengali, Gujarati, Marathi, and Punjabi".
Also, it will help the company procure and produce telefilms and
other programmes for broadcast and invest in studio for in-house
production.
The FIPB go-ahead
to the proposal came after the Information and Broadcasting Ministry
supported it. The Department of Economic Affairs also supported
the proposal. The arrangement with Crombie is among the various
steps that Broadcast Worldwide has initiated to bring in fresh investment
and restructure the company. Crombie is a strategic investment company
and it is keen on common equity participation in Broadcast Worldwide,
according to a Broadcast Worldwide official.
In another
step towards restructuring, the shareholding pattern of Broadcast
Worldwide is also set to change shortly. According to an official,
the total stake of financial institutions (Industrial Development
Bank of India, Unit Trust of India, Gujarat Venture Finance Ltd
and the rest) in Broadcast Worldwide is set to increase to 33 per
cent from the current 20 per cent. At present, Mr Rathikant Basu
and associates including Star hold 40 per cent, Sterling Infotech
has another 40 per cent and FIs have the remaining 20 per cent.
The stake of the FIs is expected to go up during the second round
of funding, the official said.
Among its other
plans, Mr Rathikant Basu-promoted Broadcast Worldwide is looking
at a new uplinking option, again as a measure to turn the company
around.
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