Investment bank Morgan Stanley has sent out preliminary sales brochures on Premiere to over 20 as-yet-unnamed parties in a bid to secure take-over bids for the ailing German pay-TV platform.

The groups, understood to include financial, venture capital and other media concerns, have between 2-3 weeks to submit provisional offers for the platform that has struggled to attract subscribers in a country that has more than 30 free-to-air channels to chose from.

The pay-TV platform, which recently signed a new film package deal with Vivendi Universal, has just 2.4m subscribers and has been desperately looking for savings as it fights to avoid the insolvent fate of its parent KirchMedia.

Last month Premier managing director Georg Kofler said he was looking to shave at least 50% off the cost of acquiring film rights and said he was also in negotiations with Formula One about reducing the price of rights to televise races.

The company has debts of around $1bn and needs investment of at least $250m if it is to reach its profitability target of 2004.