After months of negotiations and intensive search, Kuwaiti-based Zain, finally signed a $14 billion deal, transferring 46 per cent ownership of the company to an Indian/Malaysian telecoms consortium.
The deal was signed on September 8, between the Kuwaiti' Zain and the consortium, which consists of Malaysia's Al-Bukhari Group and India's Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd., India's largest communications service provider, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd. (BSNL) and Vavasi Group, the Kuwait Times Reported
The sealing of the deal might result in yet another name-change sooner than later, of the mobile network, which has witnessed many christenings as the years went by.
Bader Al-Khorafi, a top executive of Kuwait's Al-Khorafi Group, the largest private shareholder in Zain, said "the value of the sale, expected to be around $14 billion, would be paid in one time in according with Kuwait Stock Exchange rules."
Zain Africa
The Zain Group is still interested in selling off its African mobile networks.
"The company is in talks to sell its African assets- excluding Morocco and Sudan-after French media and telecoms conglomerate, Vivendi broke off talks on buying the operations," said a spokesman for Zain Kuwaiti.
But Farid Arifuddin, managing director of Vavasi Telegence, which is part of India's Vavasi Group, said the new shareholders did not plan to offload the African operations. "The consortium will not sell its African assets," a Vavasi official said. "Our plan is to consolidate networks further and roll out larger networks and cover greater markets. It's not to sell for sure."
Reliance Communications, one of the major mobile operators in India, is said to be in talks for the Zain Africa assets.
But in a telephone interview with NEXT, Emeka Oparah, Head Public Relations, Zain Nigeria, simply said: "I have no comments."
NEXT had in June, reported on an initial $12 billion Zain Africa deal with the French media and telecoms company, Vivendi, but which never sailed through.
The Investors
Reuters reports that the Vavasi Group, an india company has interests in telecoms, real estate, renewable energy, steel and cement. The company is set to start wireless telecoms services in India, based on the Chinese TD-SCDMA (Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access) technology.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam LTD (BSNL) a state-owned telecoms company, is India's fourth-largest mobile operator, with 56 million subscribers as at the end of July 2009. The company is said to have 28.6 million fixed-line subscribers, said to be India's second-largest telecoms firm by subscribers, trailing behind its only market leader; Bharti Airtel.
Mahanagar Telephone Nigam LTD (MTNL), is a telecoms operator in India with operations in New-York, Nepal and Mauritius, through a joint venture with other companies.
MTNL is also one of the core investors that have submitted interest in the bidding for Nigerian's telecoms firm: NITEL. The company was on the list of investors, that have expressed interest in the firm listed by the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) last week.
Syed Mokhtar is the only individual investor in the deal. His business is said to link many Malaysian firms, including transport-to-construction group MMC automotive and property firm, DRB-Hicom and plantation company Tradewinds.
The company's 65 million clients are located throughout 23 countries in the Middle East and Africa. As at yesterday, its capitalization stands at around $23 billion. It is one of the three mobile operators in Kuwait, along with National Telecommunications Co (Wataniya) and Kuwait Telecommunications Co (VIVA). Qatar Telecom owns a majority stake in Wataniya, while VIVA is run by the Saudi Telecoms.
In the stock market, Zain's stocks are trading at around KD1.500. The Kuwait government owns the largest stake of 24.6 percent in Kuwait's oldest mobile operator. Zain has a paid-up capital of KD427.5 million, representing 4.275 billion shares. A 46-percent stake would equal about two billion shares and at a price of KD2 a share, the deal would be worth KD3.933 billion.
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