RTL Group Inks Deal to Offload Five

LUXEMBOURG: RTL Group is selling British broadcaster Five to publisher Richard Desmond’s Northern & Shell company for 125 million euros (£103.5 million).

The deal closes immediately. Announcing the agreement, Gerhard Zeiler, CEO of RTL Group, said: “With a significant recovery of the U.K. TV advertising market and Five performing well in the first half of 2010, we saw a window of opportunity to realize a transaction based on a fair evaluation of Five. The disposal is in line with RTL Group’s strategy of being number one or two in each of our markets. I would like to thank the whole team at Five and CEO and Chair Dawn Airey for their passion and professionalism, especially in the difficult past 20 months which saw a comprehensive restructuring of the company.”

Northern & Shell owns Daily Express, Daily Star, New Magazine and Star Magazine in the U.K. In the TV arena, it operates the adult services Television X—The Fantasy Channel and the Red Hot channels.