Rogers Communications confirms agreement with Altice USA to purchase Canadian assets of Cogeco

Agreement conditional upon successful acquisition of Cogeco by Altice USA

TORONTO, Sept. 02, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Rogers Communications Inc. (“Rogers”) today confirmed its agreement with Altice USA, Inc. (“Altice USA”) (NYSE: ATUS) to purchase all of the Canadian assets of Cogeco Inc. (“CGO”) and Cogeco Communications Inc. (“CCA”, together with CGO, “Cogeco”) for a net purchase price of approximately $4.9 billion. The transaction is conditional upon completion of the Altice USA offer on the terms publicly announced today.

As the largest long-term shareholder of Cogeco, Rogers is supportive of the value being created for all shareholders with the significant premium in the Altice USA offer. Rogers currently owns 41% of the outstanding CGO subordinate voting shares (“CGO SVS”) and 33% of outstanding CCA subordinate voting shares (“CCA SVS”).

Under the terms of the all-cash offer by Altice USA to purchase all of the outstanding shares of CGO and CCA, the offer prices and premiums are as follows:

• C$800 million to Mr. Louis Audet, Executive Chairman of Cogeco, and members of the Audet family for their controlling ownership interests, which include 100% of the multiple voting shares of CGO (“CGO MVS”) and approximately 0.9% of total outstanding CGO SVS.
  
  
• C$106.53 per share for the remaining CGO SVS and C$134.22 per share for each CCA SVS, representing a significant premium of 30% to each stock’s 1-month (August 2020) volume weighted average price (VWAP) on the Toronto Stock Exchange (the prices also represent a 36% premium for CGO SVS and 37% premium for CCA SVS to the August 31, 2020 closing prices, respectively).

Under the terms of the agreement with Altice USA, Rogers will be entitled to receive the premium offered by Altice USA to all subordinate voting shareholders. As a result, the net consideration to be paid by Rogers for the Canadian assets of Cogeco reflects a gross price of $5.5 billion, less the premium on the shares currently held by Rogers of $0.6 billion, less the current value of Rogers’ shares of $1.5 billion, for a net cash consideration of $3.4 billion.

Joe Natale, President and CEO of Rogers Communications, said: “Under the stewardship of Mr. Audet, the Audet family, and the 4,500 Cogeco team members, Cogeco has built an iconic company in Canada and the United States. This meaningful offer reflects the tremendous accomplishments of the Audet family and Cogeco’s employees. Rogers is excited about the opportunity to expand its breadth of industry leading technologies and products to an additional 1.8 million homes and businesses.”