SingTel, Southeast Asia’s largest telecoms firm that owns 32 per cent of Bharti, said the acquisition would be financed by debt, and there was no need for it to inject money directly into its Indian affiliate since the deal would not dilute its stake.
“In one way or the other we will be part of the funding, we are a very substantial shareholder of Bharti,” Singtel CEO International Operations, Lim Chuan Poh, told Reuters.
Bharti and Zain are in talks until March 25 for Kuwaiti firm’s operations in 15 African countries and have agreed on an enterprise value of $10.7 billion for assets, including $1.7 billion of debt on Zain Africa books.Bharti’s bid is in line with the ambitions of SingTel, which is sitting on over $1 billion in cash and wants to enter African market to offset its presence in more saturated telecoms markets.
