Tata Tele buyout: Bharti, Singtel out of race; will Reliance Jio buy?

Acquiring Tata Tele with its debt and unliberalised spectrum may be a sour deal for Reliance Jio

Tata group’s debt-ridden telecom services company Tata Teleservices continues to suffer setbacks in its efforts to get into a strategic alliance. The company is fast running out of options. And if reports of Sunil Mittal-led Bharti Airtel opting out of talks is anything to go by, the only speculated suitor now might be Reliance Jio Infocomm, for which buying out Tata Tele might not be a very attractive proposition.

For Jio, which has a base of 125 million users, at present, buying out Tata Teleservices would make sense only if the latter is willing to sweeten the deal by selling