It‘s taking up a public position. Satellite operator Intelsat Ltd, announced on 8 March, that it would be making an initial public offering of its ordinary shares valued at around $500 million before end 2002. The company is also giving its current shareholders a chance to offload their stock during the IPO.

In a press release issued yesterday, Intelsat said that it expects to file its IPO registration statement with the US Securities & Exchange Commission in mid-2002.

The purpose of the IPO: to raise funds for general corporate purposes and to repay outstanding debt, and to comply with the Open-Market Reorganization for the Betterment of International Telecommunications Act (known as the ORBIT Act). Under this act, Intelsat Ltd has to complete its IPO before 31 December 2002.

The following is the text of a faxed message received by Indiantelevision.com from Turner Interational India managing director Anshuman Misra.

I refer to the article on indiantelevision.com "Government looks ready to lift DTH FDI; Zee-AOL-Time Warner and News Corp likely to announce DTH ventures."

The reference to a joint venture between AOL-TW and Zee is totally baseless and is pure speculation. We would like to clarify that it is Turner who is hosting the reception in honour of Mr Levin and not "AOL Time Warner CEO Gerald Levin and the Zee Network chairman Subhash Chandra" as incorrectly stated in the article.