Reliance Communications Ltd., India's second-largest mobile-phone company, may combine its operations with MTN Group Ltd. after the South African operator's talks with Bharti Airtel Ltd. collapsed.
Reliance has exclusive negotiating rights with MTN for as long as 45 days, the Mumbai-based company said in an e-mailed statement today. There is no certainty on the completion or the timing of any agreement, it said.
An agreement would help Reliance Chairman Anil Ambani form an operator with a combined market value of more than $65 billion and offer mobile-phone services to 1.7 billion people stretching from the Cape of Good Hope to the Himalayas. New Delhi-based Bharti said on May 24 it ended talks with MTN after failing to overcome differences over control.
“Reliance may be one company that could possibly do it,'' Apurva Shah, head of research at Prabhudas Lilladher Pvt. in Mumbai, said by phone after Bharti's announcement. “If it was tough for Bharti, it will be tough for other Indian companies.''
Reliance began talks to buy a majority stake in MTN, the Business Standard reported on its Web site on May 24, citing people it didn't identify.
Source: Bloomberg