Cogeco Cable has struck an $82-million deal to buy all the outstanding shares of Cablevue and related companies operating the Belleville, Ont. cable system.

The Belleville system, which serves about 33,400 basic service customers, will be interconnected to neighboring systems in Ontario owned by Cogeco Cable, pending crtc approval.

Cogeco will pay approximately $27.3 million in cash and the balance through the issue of subordinate voting shares.

According to Cogeco Cable president and ceo Louis Audet, following the acquisition, Cogeco will serve approximately 640,000 basic cable customers in Ontario and close to 909,000 in total.

In early April, Shaw Communications agreed to sell its roughly 4.5 million shares in Cogeco Cable and Cogeco Inc. to Rogers Communications at $44 per share. Rogers also acquired an additional 1,234,700 subordinate voting shares of Cogeco Cable and 466,300 subordinate voting shares in Cogeco Inc. from a subsidiary of Shaw, bringing the cable giant’s interest in Cogeco Cable to 12.7% and in Cogeco Inc. to 11.3%. *