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Sambhar Mafia - Cooked To Kill!

Saturday, October 29, 2005

Vodafone to buy 10% stake in Bharti

Vodafone’s decision to buy 10% stake in Bharti Televentures (BTVL) is probably among the largest FDI made by any foreign investor. I was just reading the Bharti cover story in Business Today (dt 25th September) and they had a small interview with Sunil Mittal. There was a specific question related to Vodafone’s India plans and this was what Mr. Mittal said:

Q: Have you been approached by Vodafone?
A: Nobody at all. I think we would be approached if we were available. We have always made it very clear that we were not.

Mittal: Laughing his way to the bank

No CEO will reveal the name of a potential acquirer with whom they are in touch with, but Mittal could have atleast said that they were willing to divest stake provided the price, time and strategic fit were right.

SingTel already holds a 30% stake in BTVL and Bharti Enterprises (the promoting entity) holds a controlling stake of 45.9% in BTVL. The FDI cap in the telecom sector has been raised to 74% recently and it looks like we can expect more action in this sector.

posted by Kaps at 5:13 PM

3 Comments:

  • Surprised Vodafone decided to take a stake in Bharti when Singtel already has a 30% stake in BTVL .. the raise in FDI cap is defly bound to attract more foreign firms which will sallivate at the huge potential in india.

    By Blogger Cogito, at 9:37 AM  

  • Kaps, thanks for the plug in DesiPundit. BTW you have enabled word verification and YET get spam?

    :-)

    By Blogger Krish, at 12:20 AM  

  • @Hiren,
    Even I feel that he won't let go of this so easily. SingTel might sell out to Vodafone in the long run.

    @Anon,
    How are spams surpassing the word verification. You guys are way too smart

    @Cogito,
    Evn I'm surprised. But Vodafone is the world's largest mobile operator and they might want to gain a foothold in the Indian market

    @Thennavan,
    U r welcome. Even I'm surprised about the spams.

    By Blogger Kaps, at 12:53 AM  

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