Oct. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Grupo Televisa SA, the world’s largest Spanish-language broadcaster, wants to increase its cable TV holdings and may seek a partner to buy wireless airwaves for mobile high-speed Internet service.

Televisa, which controls three cable operators and the Sky satellite-TV service in Mexico, also may apply for licenses to become a second cable carrier in Mexican markets that already have a provider, Executive Vice President Alfonso de Angoitia said today on a conference call.

It’s using pay-TV acquisitions to boost growth as the recession in Mexico hurts broadcast-advertising sales. The company’s cable carriers are winning customers from Telefonos de Mexico SAB, the country’s largest phone company, with packages of TV, voice and Internet service. Angoitia said Televisa may bid in Mexico’s auctions of wireless airwaves to begin offering a mobile-Internet service.

“We’re talking to a lot of people,” Angoitia said. “Large companies that have experience internationally where they’ve gone into situations where they’re competing with incumbents and been very aggressive in offerings of wireless types of services -- that’s one possibility.”

Telefonica SA, based in Spain, and Reston, Virginia-based NII Holdings Inc. offer mobile-phone service in Mexico and other parts of Latin America. Mexico City- based America Movil SAB, which also has wireless networks throughout the region, is considered the “incumbent” in Mexico with about 72 percent of the nation’s wireless customers.

Megacable

Televisa gained 46 centavos to 52.90 pesos at 4 p.m. New York time in Mexico City trading. The shares had climbed 30 percent this year before today.

Megacable Holdings SAB, Mexico’s biggest cable operator, fell 1.05 pesos, or 3.2 percent, to 31.60 pesos today after de Angoitia said Televisa has no interest “in the short term” in buying the company. The decline was the most in a month. The shares climbed earlier this month on speculation it would be acquired.

Televisa may want to enter Megacable’s territory, which includes Guadalajara, Mexico’s second-largest city, Martin Lara, an analyst at Vector Casa de Bolsa SA in Mexico City, said in a research note. That could hurt Megacable, he said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Crayton Harrison in Mexico City at tharrison5@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: October 23, 2009 16:21 EDT