Tele Columbus to Be RestructuredTele Columbus to Be Restructured

LONDON -- Lenders and the owner-consortium comprised ofholding companies have agreed on a restructuring solution for the German cablenetwork company Tele Columbus. An independent holding operating under Luxembourglaw is taking over the Lower Saxon multimedia and telecommunicationsprovider, which was part of the Escaline subsidiary Orion Cable. The holding companyis independent of the company's over 100 international lending institutions andprevious owners and will be controlled by the Nikolaus & Co. LLP boutique investmentbanking firm, which specializes in financial restructuring. The settlement eliminatedany need for the auction of Tele Columbus shares, which had been scheduled forDecember 30, 2009.

Stefan Benedetti of Nikolaus & Co. in London says, "We were happy to take on the challengeof financially stabilizing Tele Columbus. The Tele Columbus Group is an enterprise whoseoperations run superbly. The agreement with the lenders enables us to develop anappropriate, future-oriented capital structure for the company. The distinctive feature aboutthis solution is that we are not bound to instructions from any individual interests." The goal ofNikolaus & Co. is to free the cable network operator, which has some 2.3 million connectedhouseholds, of debts, to restructure it and to give it a "going-concern value that is in line withmarket conditions".

Tele Columbus AG