Sit-up TV operates three digital home-shopping channels - bid tv, price-drop tv and speed auction tv. Virgin said the company's live programs are available to viewers in more than 20m homes in the UK. Launched in 2000, Sit-up TV, generated revenues of £242m in 2008.
Virgin Media wrote down the value of Sit-up by £54.8m in February, reflecting, it said, the impact of the recession and the loss of one of its two Freeview channels.
Virgin Media would not confirm whether the sale means its other content assets such as its 50% stake in UKTV and its Virgin Media TV arm, owner of channels such as Living and Virgin1, are now formally up for sale.
In March, however, the prospects of a sale of Virgin Media's content operations rose after it was announced that Malcolm Wall, chief executive of Virgin Media's content division, is leaving the company this month.
It is thought Wall opted to leave after coming to the conclusion that Virgin Media no longer wants to retain its content business.
According to a Virgin Media insider at the time of the Wall announcement: "Virgin has made statements in recent times that the content division is not going to be core moving forward nor is Virgin going to expand the division so it's a good time for Malcolm to leave."
The sale of Virgin Media's content operations, for an expected £500m, as exclusively revealed by Media Week in February, would put up for sale a collection of the leading TV assets in the UK.
Aurelius said it plans to expand its home shopping business. Last July, it acquired Germany's RTL Shop for an undisclosed sum.
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