iesy Repository GmbH - Irish Stock Exchange
SUMMARY This summary highlights certain information contained in this Prospectus. This summary does not contain all the information you should consider before investing in the Notes. You should read this entire Prospectus carefully, including “Risk Factors,” “Operating and Financial Review and Prospects of iesy,” “Operating and Financial Review and Prospects of ish,” the iesy and ish financial statements and the notes to those financial statements. Our Company We are the largest cable television operator in the German states of Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia, with approximately 5.3 million subscribers. The regions in which we operate are characterized by attractive demographics for providing services over cable networks. Hesse has the highest GDP per capita, and North Rhine-Westphalia has the highest population density, in each case, of the nine former DTAG cable regions in Germany. We provide basic and premium cable television, high speed Internet access and telephony services. Our network passes approximately 8.4 million homes out of approximately 11.2 million total homes in the region, representing a 75.0% coverage rate, of which approximately 5.3 million homes are connected to our network and subscribe to our services, a 63.1% penetration rate. The upgraded portion of our network passes more than 1.5 million homes. The largest part of our business is the provision of basic cable television services, which is characterized by stable revenues and cash flows. For the year ended December 31, 2004 on a pro forma basis, we generated total revenues of €560.0 million and Adjusted EBITDA (as defined herein) of €262.2 million and €560.8 million of total revenues and €265.8 million of Adjusted EBITDA for the twelve months ended March 31, 2005. The ish Acquisition On March 11, 2005, iesy Hessen entered into a definitive agreement with Kabelnetz Ltd. to acquire ish (the “ish Acquisition”). The ish Acquisition closed on June 24, 2005 and was funded by a combination of existing cash on hand and the proceeds of the Refinancing and the Financing. See “The ish Acquisition” for further details. Our increased scale and advanced infrastructure are expected to reduce costs, limit capital expenditures, decrease reliance on suppliers, and open up new strategic opportunities. Economies of scale will allow us to purchase goods and services more cheaply, deploy capital more efficiently and spread costs and investments across a larger revenue base. By the end of 2005, our network and state-of-the-art network operations center (“NOC”) should technically enable us to distribute premium cable television signals to the vast majority of our homes passed. Our increased scale together with our combined technical platform also will make us a more attractive partner for broadcasters and content providers. The combined entity will furthermore benefit from cost synergies as well as the harmonization of best practices and products across both iesy and ish. The integration of two businesses in adjacent regions will be facilitated by their similar network strategies, a shared history of ownership by and separation from DTAG and similar corporate cultures. We intend to keep customer-oriented functions localized and take a deliberate approach to integrating other areas of the combined business. Our Products and Services Our products and services include the following: • Basic cable television. Our current basic cable offering consists of 30 to 36 analog television channels (depending on the region served) and up to 39 analog radio channels. Furthermore, homes that have a set-top box installed can also receive digital programming including that of the public broadcasters ARD and ZDF. Subscription and installation fees for our basic cable television business generated €480.0 million, or 85.7%, of our total revenues for the year ended December 31, 2004 and €117.6 million or 86.2% of our total revenues for the three months ended March 31, 2005 on a pro forma basis. We also received carriage fees totalling €41.2 million (7.4% of our total revenues) for the year ended December 31, 2004 and €10.6 million or 7.8% for the three months ended March 31, 2005 on a pro forma basis from national, regional and local broadcasters for the distribution of their programming over our network. • Premium cable television. Our primary premium cable television offerings are marketed under the “ish Digital TV” brand in North Rhine-Westphalia. Packages offered under this brand include ish Music, ish Active, ish Lifestyle and ish Kino, which is a pay-per-view service provided by arrivo. Our premium cable television products also include foreign-language program packages, and an English language program package introduced in the fourth quarter of 2004 in Frankfurt and southern Hesse. We plan to extend the ish premium cable television offerings to Hesse, and the iesy tv USA UK television offerings to North Rhine-Westphalia, and we also intend to launch additional premium cable television services. This will be facilitated by the similar network strategies of iesy and ish, technically allowing the NOC in Kerpen to service the vast majority of our homes connected by the 14
end of 2005. Our subscribers can also gain access to the premium cable television offerings of Premiere, the dominant German pay television provider. We estimate that more than 600,000 cable television homes in Hesse and North Rhine-Westphalia subscribe to Premiere, from whom we receive carriage fees for the transmission of their premium cable television programs throughout our network. • High speed Internet access. We provide high speed Internet services at speeds ranging from 128 kbit/s to 5 Mb/s. iesy’s products include iesy Multimedia-Anschluss, a service tailored for housing associations to enable their properties for Internet access and to purchase Internet access at 128 kbit/s on a bulk basis. iesy internet 256 is a 256 kbit/s flat-rate product designed to encourage Internet users to upgrade from dial-up access, while iesy internet 2000 provides access at a higher speed of 2 Mb/s. ish’s products include ish flat at a speed of 256 kbit/s, ish flat plus at 2 Mb/s and ish flat pro at 5 Mb/s. Due to the improved economics of upgrading our network resulting from technological advances and lower equipment costs, we recently recommenced the upgrade of certain parts of our network. Our upgraded network now passes over 1.5 million homes. This represents a 27.2% increase of the number of upgraded homes in 2003. As of March 31, 2005 on a pro forma basis, we served approximately 21,300 high speed Internet subscribers. We intend to upgrade further parts of our network particularly in conjunction with new housing association contracts that allow us to increase the number of customers to whom we can market our high speed Internet services. • Telephony. We offer telephony services under the brand name “ish Zusammen” to subscribers in upgraded areas in North Rhine-Westphalia in conjunction with high speed Internet access services. Our telephony offering provides first-line quality of service, which is made possible by the investments in our network. The ability to offer telephony services has led to increased take-up of high speed Internet services in this region. The ish Acquisition will enable us to offer telephony services in the upgraded areas of Hesse as well. We intend to offer a similar bundle of telephony and high speed Internet access in upgraded areas of Hesse as soon as possible following the ish Acquisition. Our Free Cash Flow The combination of our strong EBITDA generation and our disciplined approach to capital investment has generated substantial free cash flow. We intend to maintain an efficient cost structure. Our primary costs consist of costs of materials, which are mainly network infrastructure expenses (21.0% of our total revenues for the year ended December 31, 2004) and personnel expenses (15.7% of our total revenues for the year ended December 31, 2004). We have streamlined and refocused our business on the relevant basic cable television customer segments. Operating costs (comprised of costs of materials, personnel expenses, and other operating expenses) were reduced from €323.2 million in 2003 to €319.6 million in the year ended December 31, 2004 on a pro forma basis, a reduction of 1.1%. Our capital expenditures in 2004 were €45.9 million on a pro forma basis and €47.4 million in the twelve months ended March 31, 2005, which includes expenditures for the recently completed upgrade of the network passing an additional 320,000 homes in Frankfurt, Bonn and Neuss. We intend to undertake future upgrades after careful consideration of the customer demand for high speed Internet access services or in conjunction with long-term housing association contracts. Our Adjusted EBITDA minus capital expenditures in 2004 was €216.3 million on a pro forma basis, or 38.6% of revenues and €218.4 million on a pro forma basis, or 38.9% of revenues for the twelve months ended March 31, 2005. This results in Adjusted EBITDA minus capital expenditures per home passed of approximately €25.70 in 2004 and €25.80 for the twelve months ended March 31, 2005. We are the leading Level 3 cable operator in Germany based on these measures. Our Markets German Television Market The German television market is the largest in Western Europe, with approximately 36.2 million television homes and a combined cable, satellite and terrestrial penetration rate of approximately 92.6% (as a percentage of approximately 39.1 million households in Germany as of March 2004). According to industry sources, the German television market accounted for approximately €12.0 billion of total public and private revenues in 2003. The television signal distribution platforms in Germany include cable networks, satellite and terrestrial systems. According to industry sources as of December 2004, approximately 19.4 million, or 53.5%, of German television homes use cable as their primary means of reception. Satellite is used in approximately 15.5 million, or 42.7%, of television homes and terrestrial transmission via antenna is used in approximately 1.4 million, or 3.8%, of television homes. 15
In addition to the warranties, spec
CAPITALIZATION The following table
Unaudited Pro Forma Condensed Conso
NOTES TO THE UNAUDITED PRO FORMA CO
(€m, except percentages) Pro form
Income Statement Data 75 Audited Ye
(7) Number of subscribers at the en
• iesy’s premium cable televisi
egulated pricing model. Fees are pa
Risks Relating to Our Indebtedness
Legal, Consulting and Management Fe
Subscribers iesy classifies its cus
2003 to €8.20 per subscriber in t
• the senior credit facilities we
average installation fees from July
Cash flow from investing activities
In the three months ended March 31,
eview and optimization of services
Cash Flow from Operating Activities
oadcasters in television and radio.
educed or increased by a material a
Income Statement Data Audited year
109 As of December 31, As of March
• ish’s premium cable televisio
In addition, ish markets pay-per-vi
Cost of Materials and Services Cost
For accounting purposes, ish treats
Subscribers ish classifies its cust
Competition ish faces significant c
This decrease was primarily due to
Net Loss Net loss was €17.9 milli
Pension Obligations As of March 31,
Term Sheets with DTAG, BRN-ish agre
estructuring liabilities, while 200
accrual for pending losses. The exp
International Financial Reporting S
Content Providers Basic Television
Digital Home” and PrimaCom offers
[GRAPHIC] [GRAPHIC] Level 4 is the
shared access basis. In this case,
The following table shows several k
In the domestic market, the German
BUSINESS Unless otherwise indicated
Germany, with approximately 30.2 mi
Prudently deploying capital. Our de
iesy’s Current Basic Cable Televi
amounted to €8.0 million or 5.9%
within iesy’s upgraded areas and
Supply The following chart shows th
Term Sheet Service Duration Offer o
y the new fiber system. See “Oper
part of settling arbitration procee
Business of ish Products and Servic
ish’s Current Basic Cable Televis
In addition to the monthly subscrip
Customers who subscribe to Premiere
Sales ish’s sales team is divided
The following chart illustrates ish
Term Sheet Service Duration Co-use
Lease of space for broadband cable
Other Significant Supply Agreements
ights themselves. As an exception,
Competition The cable television an
Introduction REGULATION German law
We assume that we will be deemed to
The Amendment provides that provisi
• Providers who had a dominant po
in the Munich office of Apax Partne
Marketing for Germany and Austria,
Gerard Tyler is ish’s Treasurer.
CERTAIN RELATIONSHIPS AND RELATED P
Beneficial Ownership The following
DESCRIPTION OF OTHER INDEBTEDNESS T
period (unless the interest period
Subordinated Bridge Facility In con
• the ability of the Obligors (ot
owed by the Insolvent Obligor will
DESCRIPTION OF THE NOTES The Issuer
in London, the Bank of New York, Ne
Issuer have agreed that iesy Hessen
Subsidiary Guarantor outstanding wh
the amount of their secured claim.
provisions described under “—De
In addition, the Intercreditor Agre
Euro Note to and including February
circumstances referred to above exi
that it has unconditionally exercis
time outstanding not exceeding (i)
description of this covenant and no
Date of any Indebtedness that has b
(13) Investments in an aggregate am
supplement or other modification) t
(1) the assumption by the transfere
Reports Whether or not required by
of the European Union on January 1,
contemporaneously with any such act
25% in principal amount of the outs
(2) provide for the assumption by a
(6) an Officer’s Certificate stat
calculated based on the relevant cu
“Bank Indebtedness” means any a
Consolidated Net Income (excluding
(9) the impact of capitalized inter
“Exchange Act” means the U.S. S
(iii) for the avoidance of doubt, a
“Nationally Recognized Statistica
(2) Investments in another Person i
(15) Permitted Collateral Liens; (1
(5) in the case of Apollo and Golde
service level agreement as replaced
“Unrestricted Subsidiary” means
The Issuer and the Trustee and thei
Secondary Market Trading The Book-E
to trade tax. The taxable gain from
date). A U.S. Holder’s adjusted t
(c) for so long as the Notes are el
PLAN OF DISTRIBUTION We, the Subsid
LEGAL MATTERS Certain legal matters
WHERE YOU CAN FIND OTHER INFORMATIO
Listing LISTING AND GENERAL INFORMA
INDEX TO FINANCIAL STATEMENTS iesy
Assets iesy Hessen GmbH & Co. KG, W
I. Application of Legal Provisions
III. Explanation of Balance Sheet a
Last year’s extraordinary expense
INDEPENDENT AUDITORS’ REPORT We h
iesy Repository GmbH, Hamburg AMEND
and remaining useful life for the i
The movements in consolidated equit
iesy Repository GmbH, Hamburg AMEND
Assets iesy Repository GmbH, Hambur
I. Basis of Presentation The consol
V. Explanations to Material Items o
Network infrastructure, rental, lea
iesy Repository GmbH, Hamburg UNAUD
1. Basis of Presentation iesy Repos
5. Explanations to Material Items o
Shareholdings of iesy Repository Gm
iesy Hessen GmbH & Co. KG, Weiterst
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The following auditors’ report (B
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Depreciation and Amortization COURT
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Goodwill. Under German GAAP, the di
Under U.S. GAAP, loan origination f
IFRS requires a purchase price allo
financial liability incurred result
€235,000,000 10 1 /8% Senior Note