Tata Tele to sell 20% stake for $500 mn

Pricing & exact quantum of stake sale to be decided by Feb 15.

Tata Teleservices Ltd, the CDMA services provider of the Tata group, is set to offload 20 per cent stake to a clutch of investors, including state-owned private equity fund Temasek of Singapore and C Sivasankaran, by February 15.

The sale is expected to fetch Tata Teleservices over $500 million. Sivasankaran, the promoter of the Sterling group, recently sold telecom service provider Aircel to Malaysia-based Maxis for $1.08 billion (Rs 4,860 crore).

Sources close to the development said negotiations were on with the investors and a final decision would be taken after Tata group supremo Ratan Tata returns to India by the weekend.

"The number of investors, the pricing and the exact quantum of stake to be divested should be decided by February 15," said the sources.

Tata Teleservices, an unlisted company, is promoted by various Tata group companies, including Tata Sons, Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd and certain other Tata firms.

Sources in the industry said Tata Teleservices had made an attempt to sale one-third stake to South Korean Telecom (SKT). But the deal did not materialise because of differences over valuation.

Tata Teleservices had over 7.1 million subscribers in November 2005 and had operations in 20 circles.

With 1 million subscriptions for its "non-stop mobile" scheme in just 45 days, Tata Teleservices increased its market share in the mobile wireless space to 4.5 per cent in November 2005 from a minuscule 1.5 per cent a year ago.