Norway-based Telenor is reportedly in talks with Tata Teleservices to merge their India operations. NTT DoCoMo (which owns a 26% of Tata Teleservices ), Telenor, and TTL have refused to comment on the reports. Telenor owns the Uninor brand in India.
The TOI report about the Telenor-TTL partnership quotes sources with ‘direct knowledge of the matter’, one of whom elaborates that NTT DoCoMo will probably retain its status in the proposed merged entity.
The deal’s finer points will be based on TRAI’s yet to be announced new acquisition policies, which might require the merged entity to return its start-up spectrum.
If the reports are true, the resulting Telenor-TTL entity would become the country’s fourth largest operator in terms of number of users, and TTL would gain a foothold in the GSM market. According to recent data, Tata Teleservices has 78.4 million mobile subscribers, and Uninor has 42.2 million subscribers.
In the recently concluded 2G spectrum auction, Telenor (or its Indian subsidiary, Telewings Communications) gained the rights to six of India’s 22 circles, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh east and west. The company reportedly spent 40.2 billion, more than the biggest two operators in the country – Bharti Airtel and Vodafone.
This news comes in the light of Tata Teleservices recently withdrawing from both the CDMA and GSM auctions, reportedly finding the reserve price to be financially non-viable.
Source: TOI