PLDT, CVC sell SPi for $300M

Telco giant PLDT Inc. and CVC Capital Partners Asia III have agreed to sell Manila-based outsourcing company SPi Global for $330 million.

PLDT, which has an 18.3-percent economic interest in SPi Global, disclosed yesterday that the buyer was Partners Group, a Switzerland-based private markets investment management firm. SPi Global is owned by CVC Capital Partners Asia III and PLDT, via PLDT Global Investments Corp.

SPi Global, which started in 1980, is a provider of outsourced services to education, science, technical and medical research publishers.

The services target a publisher’s entire value chain, from author support and content development, through copy editing and typesetting, to digitalization, database management and data analytics.

“After a period of dynamic growth under our prior owners, we are very happy to welcome Partners Group as our new business partner and look forward to working with the firm to further complement our global footprint as well as client service capabilities,” Ratan Datta, president and CEO of SPi Global, said in a separate statement. “With its prior exposure and strategic interest in the content and learning sectors, Partners Group’s experience, global network and values make it the right partner to support our continued growth.”

PLDT had recently signaled its intention to shed non-core assets, partly to shore up earnings amid competitive challenges in the telco sector. These moves included selling its stake in Manila Electric Co., a process that would be completed within 2017.

PLDT chair Manuel V. Pangilinan said the company was looking to match for the full-year 2017 last year’s core earnings of about P27.9 billion, lower by 21 percent year-on-year, on the back of these non-core asset sales.

He said recurring core profit would grow around 6 percent to P21.5 billion in 2017, following a bold strategy to win back mobile customers, grow its fixed-line internet business and cut costs.

PLDT in 2013 sold its outsourcing businesses owned by its then wholly owned subsidiary—SPi Global Holdings Inc.—to Asia Outsourcing Gamma Ltd., a company controlled by CVC. PLDT then reinvested approximately $40 million of the proceeds from the sale in the same business.

Asia Outsourcing Gamma eventually divested its healthcare business process outsourcing and customer relationship management businesses in 2014 and 2016, returning $53 million in proceeds to PLDT.