Telstra eyes Singapore's Mobile One
Australian telecom giant said to be mulling $281 mln bid
By Vivian Chu, CBS.MarketWatch.com
3:23 AM ET Jan 12, 2001
SYDNEY (CBS.MW) - Telstra Corp. is conducting due diligence to buy a stake in Singapore's second largest mobile operator, Mobile One, for about A$500 million ($280.9 million), the Australian Financial Review reported Friday.
Telstra (TLS: news, msgs) , Australia's biggest telecom firm, is in talks to buy a 15 percent stake in M1 that is now owned by Cable & Wireless (CWP: news, msgs) .
It's also talking to M1's local shareholders, the conglomerate Keppel Telecommunications & Transportation and Singapore Press Holdings, media firm (SIAEF: news, msgs) .
Telstra, a former monopoly, is under pressure to expand outside its home market and wants M1 to extend its mobile network from Hong Kong to Sydney.
A Telstra spokesman in Sydney was not immediately for comment.
U.K.-based Cable & Wireless is selling off its consumer mobile and cable assets in the Asia-Pacific region in order to focus on the higher-end corporate data and Internet markets.
However, Telstra also faces a potential contender in France Telecom (FTE: news, msgs) .
France Telecom's mobile unit Orange (ORNGADR: news, msgs) is trying to acquire 30 percent of M1 - by purchasing a 15-percent stake held by Hong Kong's Pacific Century CyberWorks (PCW: news, msgs) and C&W's 15-percent stake, reported local media earlier this week.
Telstra and CyberWorks have a 50-50 joint venture in an Internet protocol backbone joint venture valued at $6 billion. Telstra also owns a 60-percent stake in a mobile phone joint venture estimated at $3 billion.
Shares of Telstra gained 1.5 percent to close at 6.78 Australian dollars on Friday.
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