Televisa in talks with Iusacell over wireless venture

Mexican broadcast giant Grupo Televisa (NYSE: TV) is in talks with Grupo Salinas-owned operator Iusacell to explore the possibility of forming a mobile alliance, the former company announced in a release.

However, "there can be no assurances that any agreement will be reached, or of the timing or terms of any such agreement if one is reached," according to the release, which offered no further details.

Televisa - the largest media company in the Spanish-speaking world based on market cap - announced at the beginning of the month that it would acquire the 41.7% of shares in cable TV operator Cablemás that it did not already own for 4.7bn pesos (US$397mn). The idea is for Cablemás to be merged into Televisa.

If any agreement between Televisa and Iusacell is reached, it may make for strange bedfellows, since last October Televisa withdrew from a planned 19bn-peso investment for a 30% stake in Nextel Mexico, to develop 30 MHz of wireless spectrum. The breakup was due to a number of suits filed by Iusacell that questioned the validity of the auction. Since then, Nextel Mexico has been developing the spectrum by itself.

However, Televisa and Iusacell share a common interest - knocking down the empire of billionaire Carlos Slim's mobile giant América Móvil (NYSE: AMX). A number of mobile firms have demanded lower interconnection rates from AMX's Mexican firm Telcel.

Meanwhile, AMX has been building up pay-TV customers throughout Latin America at a reported rate of 230,000 subscribers a month. Regulations forbid the company from entering the pay-TV space in Mexico, but executives have been pushing the government to revoke this limitation. It is in Televisa's best interest for the regulation to stand.

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