Vodafone Denies Plans to Buy South Africa's MTN

Vodafone has refuted media reports over the weekend that the company is considering a spoiler bid for South Africa's MTN - which is currently in talks with India's Bharti Airtel over a possible takeover.

Two UK newspapers has reported that Vodafone is working on a bid for the company. The Sunday Times reported that Vodafone's CEO, Arun Sarin had told his acquisition team, led by former UBS banker Warren Finegold, to seek ways to buy South Africa based MTN - while the Telegraph reported similar without naming its sources.

"We have no intention of pursuing a bid for MTN," a Vodafone spokesman said - denying the reports.

Earlier this month, Vodafone was understood to be in talks with MTN over proposals to acquire the company's international assets outside South Africa.

Vodafone - which jointly owns South African mobile operator, Vodacom with the landline operator, Telekom - was recently reported to have become increasingly frustrated with delays in a planed sale of 15% of Telkom. The sale would have pushed Vodafone's effective control of the company above 50%, giving it control of the business without having to spend a significant sum on an acquisition. Vodacom will also need to divest a substantial stake by the end of this year to a Black Empowerment group, further diluting both companies stake in the company.

The earlier talks were confirmed by an MTN insider and by an independent source in the South African financial services sector, who is familiar with the detail of the discussions. Although Vodafone denied any talks were carrying one, MTN did confirm that Vodafone is one of several companies they are talking to - as part of normal business relations.

MTN also has very little overlap with Vodafone in their respective international markets.

source : http://www.cellular-news.com/