Florian Homm Increases Freenet Stake, Pushes Breakup (Update1)
By Kenneth Wong
Aug. 20 (Bloomberg) -- Florian Homm, a German hedge fund manager, raised his stake in Freenet AG to more than 5 percent and said Chief Executive Officer Eckhard Spoerr is less resistant to a breakup of the German Internet and phone company.
Homm, through his Absolute Capital Management Holdings Plc, increased his stake in Freenet to about 5.2 percent, he said in a phone interview today. He wouldn't rule out boosting the holding to as much as 10 percent, he said.
Freenet, based in the northern town of Buedelsdorf, put itself up for sale and hired Morgan Stanley to look for a buyer earlier this year. United Internet AG and QSC AG are among companies that have said they may be interested in some of Freenet's assets. Spoerr has so far favored a sale of the entire company rather than a breakup. Freenet has a market value of about 1.6 billion euros (2.2 billion).
Spoerr has become less resistant to a breakup of Freenet, Homm said. Spoerr declined to comment when reached by Bloomberg News today.
Freenet rose as much as 91 cents, or 5.6 percent, to 17.05 euros on the Frankfurt exchange and traded at 16.60 euros as of 1:18 p.m. local time.
Interested Parties
Telecom Italia SpA, Italy's largest phone company, was among those that have shown an interest in Freenet, two people who asked not to be identified said on Aug. 8. A Telecom Italia spokesman said on the same day that the Milan-based company wasn't considering an acquisition of Freenet.
Freenet was formed by the combination of Mobilcom AG, Germany's second-largest reseller of wireless services, and its Freenet.de AG unit. That transaction, first announced in 2005, was completed in March.
Freenet had 1.2 million digital subscriber line Internet customers and 5.2 million wireless clients at the end of June.
CEO Spoerr repeatedly fended off calls by some investors to break up the company only months after it was created. He said in an Aug. 8 interview that he wasn't under any time pressure to find a strategic solution.
Ralph Dommermuth, the CEO of United Internet, Germany's second-largest Internet access provider, said on Aug. 10 that the company has been approached by Morgan Stanley.