Showtime Arabia and Orbit to merge

Kuwait: Investment firm Kuwait Projects Co (Kipco) said on Sunday it had agreed to merge its pay-television subsidiary Showtime Arabia with Orbit Group, a unit of a Saudi Arabia Mawarid Group.

Showtime Arabia is owned by Gulf DTH, a joint-venture between Kipco and US media conglomerate Viacom.

"The new company is a partnership between the Orbit Group, a member of the Riyadh-based Mawarid Group, and Showtime Arabia," Kipco said in a statement without giving the value of the deal. Kipco, which has stakes in 50 companies and operates in 21 countries, owns a 75.3 per cent of Showtime Arabia, It has said previously that it was in talks with media firms to merge the unit, which might be floated later.

Kipco, which controls assets worth $19 billion, had planned to offer shares to the public in Showtime Arabia in 2006 but postponed the plan, citing a downturn of Arab markets. Shares of Kipco were down 1 per cent on Sunday, while Kuwait's main index ended slightly higher 0.04 per cent.