In the run up to unlocking value in the tower business by telecom companies, there is now talk of a possibility of a merger of the tower business of three GSM mobile operators – Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular which would create a mega tower company.

Telecom companies already have an agreement to share their tower infrastructure which consists of around 70,000 towers across India. Bharti has around 40,000 towers while Vodafone and Idea Cellular have 20,000 and 10,000 towers respectively.

The merger would help the companies to get a higher valuation rather than their individual business as it would lead to better operations, lower costs  and technical efficiency as towers could be positioned more strategically without overlapping of the areas.

For the equity component in the new company, one proposal being worked out is to give equity share according to number of towers each operator owns. This would mean Bharti would hold 57% stake while Vodafone and Idea would hold 28.5% and 14.5% stake respectively.

One possible reason for the idea of this merger could be the impending entry of new telecom operators in the country who have applied for new licences. Then, the infrastructure could be offered to new entrants bringing in more revenues.

Reliance Communications had earlier sold 5% of its tower business for $345 million and is forging an alliance with American Tower Corporation. via

India is not an easy place to work with. With just months before formally launching the ‘Vodafone’ brand in India, the company is getting to face several legal and corporate issues.

Earlier this week, Vodafone Essar received an income tax notice for tax claims of around $1.7 billion. And now, its 33% partner, Essar has filed for a nationwide telecom licence under the name ShippingStop.com, which is a fully owned subsidiary of BPL Mobile. This step may have a business conflict and may not go down well with Vodafone.

Previously, BPL Mobile was acquired by Hutch-Essar but due to regulatory issues of spectrum transfer, the deal got cancelled. Essar has a 9.9% direct stake in BPL below the 10% limit. It also owns stake in BPL through series of fund associated with Essar. Now, the entire issue of the ownership of BPL is under arbitration.

But the move of Essar may not get any favourable response from the authorities as it is already a part of big telecom combine and has a retail telecom venture. A case in this regard is when Tata Telecom had to give up its stake in Idea Cellular when it applied for a separate licence.

But one positive for Essar may be the fact that TRAI is in favour of doing away with number of operators in a circle. As a result of which, several companies like Parsvnath Developers, Swan Telecom, Datacom Solutions, S Tel, Idea Cellular, Cheetah Corporate Services, Bycell Telecom, Spice Communications and HFCL Infotel have sought for Unified Access licenses. 

In a bid to substitute use of greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels, biofuels or fuel processed from plants is catching attention of producers as well as investors. There are two kinds of biofuel – ethanol, processed from sugarcane or corn, and biodiesel, made from biomass.

India’s leading investors Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, C Sivasankaran, Vinod Khosla are betting on bio-fuel as it may become a viable substitute to use of natural fuel.

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India’s eighth largest GSM operator offering services in Punjab and Karnataka, Spice Communications, is coming out of its IPO from June 25-27 with a price band of Rs.41-46 per share. It becomes the fifth telecom company to be listed after Bharti Airtel, Idea Cellular, Reliance Communications and Tata Tele (Mah).

Spice Tele intends to raise Rs 520 crore by issuing 11.31 crore equity shares comprising 16.39% of capital. The company also did a pre-IPO placement of 2.48 crore shares at Rs.45 each to Lehman Brothers and Sinnaker Investments.

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