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Bharti Airtel Acquires Zain’s Mobile Ops in 15 African Countries
IT News Online Staff
2010-06-09
Bharti Airtel Ltd. has completed its acquisition of Zain Group’s mobile operations in 15 countries across Africa for an enterprise valuation of $10.7 billion. With this acquisition, Airtel will become the first Indian brand to go truly global with a footprint that covers over 1.8 billion people. Bharti also becomes a major Indian MNC with operations in 18 countries across Asia and Africa with a customer base of over 180 million.
The transaction is the largest ever cross-border deal in emerging markets and will result in combined revenues of over $12.4 billion and EBITDA of over $4.7 billion, based on the last audited results. Bharti is now among the five largest mobile operators in the world.
Sunil Bharti Mittal, Chairman and Managing Director, Bharti, said, "We are delighted at the closure of this transformational deal for India and Bharti. We would like to express our deep gratitude and thank the governments of all the 15 countries as well as the government of India for their overwhelming support to this landmark event. This will further strengthen the historic Indo-Africa economic and social ties and provide a big boost to South-South cooperation."
"Bharti, which has been working towards its vision of expansion into Africa, is committed to contributing to the growth of telecom in the region by taking networks deep into these countries and providing affordable services that touch the common man. We also promise our customers in Africa a superior brand experience and a portfolio of innovative products and services," said Mittal.
"We would like to welcome over 6,500 talented and highly qualified professionals to the Bharti family and look forward to working with them to take these operations from strength to strength. We would like to thank the Zain team for their professionalism, which enabled us to close this transaction in a record time," added Mittal.
Asaad Al-Banwan, Chairman, Zain, said, "We wholeheartedly wish Bharti Airtel great success in continuing the development of telecommunications across the African continent, and we are confident that the people of Africa will welcome such a committed and reputable telecom powerhouse."
Bharti’s acquisition of Zain’s African mobile services operations covers 15 countries with a total customer base of over 42 million. The total population base covered is over 450 million with telecom penetration of approximately 32%. The countries in which Bharti has acquired the operations are Burkina Faso, Chad, Congo Brazzaville, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.
Bharti was advised on the transaction by Standard Chartered Bank as the Lead Advisor, Barclays Capital as the Joint Lead Advisor and SBI Group as the Lead Onshore Advisor. Global Investment House, Kuwait was the Regional Advisor.
Standard Chartered Bank, Barclays, SBI Group, ANZ, BNP, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Credit Agricole CIB, DBS, HSBC, Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation are Bharti’s financiers for the deal.
Herbert Smith LLP was International Legal Advisor to Bharti, Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy LLP was the Financing Arrangement Legal Advisor and AZB & Partners was the Indian Legal Advisor. Ernst & Young was the Accounting advisor.
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