Reliance Communications is in “advanced stage of negotiations” with a number of private equity backed consortia to divest its stake in tower subsidiary Reliance Infratel, the Chairman, Mr Anil Ambani, told shareholders today.
“When we hopefully conclude the Reliance Infratel transaction, it will be the largest private equity transaction in the history of this country,” Mr Ambani said at the annual general meeting of the company. RCom is expected to sell between 51-95 per cent stake in the tower business. Recent news reports have said that private equity giants Blackstone and Carlyle Group have jointly expressed interest to bid for RCom's tower business.
This is the second attempt by the company to sell its tower assets. RCom had earlier announced a partnership with GTL Infrastructure but that deal fell through after the latter pulled out. Another Indian tower firm Viom Networks had earlier pulled out of the race citing differences in the valuation.
Separately, Mr Ambani said that RCom promoters are also looking at increasing their stake in the company to about 75 per cent at an “opportune” time. As per the new SEBI takeover code, the maximum stake a promoter and persons acing in concert can hold 75 per cent in the company
The RCom scrip was up by 3.78 per cent to close at Rs 80.95 on the Bombay Stock Exchange today.