BackAirtel buys 4.9% stake in Bharti Infratel for ₹2,882 cr
Prior to the acquisition, Bharti Airtel and Nettle Infrastructure held 23.04% and 13.69%, respectively, in Bharti lnfratel
PremiumBharti Airtel Ltd, through its wholly owned subsidiary Nettle Infrastructure Investments Ltd, on Wednesday acquired an additional stake of 133 million shares or 4.94% in tower company Bharti Infratel Ltd for ₹2,882.32 crore, according to a filing.
Prior to the acquisition, Bharti Airtel and Nettle Infrastructure held 23.04% and 13.69%, respectively, in Bharti lnfratel. With this acquisition by Nettle, the aggregate shareholding of Bharti Airtel and Nettle has increased from 36.73%in the September quarter to 41.66% in lnfratel.
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The stake was acquired from private equity firm Providence Equity Partners, which sold 77.08 million shares for an average of ₹215.44, aggregating to ₹1,660.61 crore.
These were held through P5 Asia Holding Investments Mauritius Ltd and EdgePoint Global Portfolio and EdgePoint Growth & Income Portfolio, which sold 31.21 million and 18.11 million shares, respectively, for ₹672.83 crore and ₹390.44 crore.
In September, Bharti Infratel’s board decided to proceed with the scheme for merger with Indus Towers, and that the cash consideration chosen by Vodafone Idea Ltd for its 11.15% stake in Indus Towers is expected to be about ₹4,000 crore.
The merger was completed last month.
Vodafone Idea has received cash consideration of ₹3,760.1 crore for its 11.15% shareholding in Indus, while Vodafone Group and Providence were allotted 28.2% and 3.2% respectively.
Bharti Infratel Ltd posted a 24% drop in consolidated net profit to ₹733 crore for the quarter ended September 2020 against a net profit of ₹964 crore in the corresponding period of 2019-20.
Consolidated revenue grew 2% to ₹3,695 crore during the reported quarter from ₹3,638 crore in the year-ago period.
Shares of Bharti Infratel closed at ₹224.80 on Wednesday, up 4.10% from its previous close, while the Sensex lost 0.08% to close at 4,4618.04. Bharti Airtel was up 1.16%.
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