July 6 (SeeNews) - Estonia's Piletilevi Group, a ticket sales platform servicing the Baltic states, said on Thursday that it is acquiring an 80.2% stake in Romanian ticket sales company Bilete.ro for an undisclosed price.
The transaction will be completed upon approval from the relevant local authorities and the remaining minority stake of 19.8% will be retained by Bilete.ro, Piletilevi said in a press release quoting Sven Nuutman, the group’s CEO.
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Andreea Pop, CEO and partner at Bilete.ro, will also retain her position.
Piletilevi Group’s entry on the Romanian market marks the beginning of its geographical expansion, which was previously slowed down by the global health crisis and the war in Ukraine. The buyer is actively seeking further expansion opportunities both in Romania and in neighbouring countries, according to Nuutman.
"We definitely want to bring the latest software solutions for the ticketing environment to the Romanian market, contribute to the development of organisers' self-service environment and analytical reports, and offer event organisers the best marketing opportunities based on our long-term experience," Nuutman added.
Piletilevi Group’s 26-year experience of selling nearly 7.5 million tickets for events every year will improve Romanian organisers’ chances of attracting more foreign artists to Romania, according to Pop.
Piletilevi Group is an international ticket sales and event organiser that is owned by Nuutman’s investment company EastCom Capital and BaltCap private equity funds. The group includes Piletilevi in Estonia, Bilesu Serviss in Latvia and Bilietai.lt in Lithuania.
Bilete.ro has been operating on the Romanian market for 17 years, selling over 1.5 million tickets annually. Attracting one million online monthly visits, the Bilete.ro platform mainly services sports events, electronic music festivals, children’s entertainment and theatre.