Last week, Essar had decided to prepay $900 million of this debt to foreign lenders.
The Reserve Bank of India has rejected Essar Communications' application to pledge its equity in Hutchison Essar Ltd to Standard Chartered Bank, London.
Essar Communications mandates four international banks to arrange a fully-underwritten $3.59 billion term loan
Essar holds the key for the future of telecom joint venture Hutch-Essar, as domestic and global firms, including Reliance Communications and British giant Vodafone, reportedly vie with each other to acquire the country's third-largest mobile operator
'He asserted in his usual jovial style that he was not an MBA like his audience at IIM-Ahmedabad but perhaps had an even better business degree: MBB'. 'He went on to explain to his perplexed, blue chip B-School audience that MBB stood for "Marwadi by birth"!' Shivanand Kanavi salutes Shashi Ruia, co-founder of the Essar group who passed into the ages on November 25, 2024 in Mumbai.
An alleged unauthorised communication equipment has been seized from the office of prominent NGO Greenpeace at a village in Singrauli district of Madhya Pradesh and two persons have been arrested for trying to disrupt the police probe, a senior police official said on Wednesday.
The stock market on Friday greeted with enthusiasm the reports of Reliance Communications planning acquisition of rival Hutch-Essar, as the Anil Ambani group firm gained a massive Rs 4,000 crore (Rs 40 billion) in market value.
Rival bidders Vodafone and Reliance Communications are studying the possibility of taking an indirect route to acquire control of Hutchison Essar to skirt the right of first refusal claimed by the Essar group.
The Kenyan government has dumped the Mumbai-based group in favour of a Libyan company for a 50 per cent stake in a refinery project in Mombasa. Essar officials said they are still negotiating with the Kenyan government so that they can invest in the project.
The Ruias and other promoters own a 99.99 per cent stake through various companies in BPL Mobile Communications. They have already toned it down to 82.4 per cent, sources close to the development said. Now, the group is looking at further bringing it down to less than 70 per cent. This will make BPL Mobile Communications a shell company and diminish its values making its shares 'worthless,' says Vodafone.
In a major acquisition in the telecom sector, the Ruia-controlled Essar Group on Wednesday bought a controlling stake in BPL Communications for a consideration of over Rs 4,400 crore (Rs 44 billion).
Formally throwing its hat in the Reliance Communications said it was looking to acquire its rival Hutch-Essar and has received funding support for the proposed deal.
The Department of Telecommunications has suggested forfeiture of the performance bank guarantee given by Hutchison-Essar and imposed a penalty of Rs 50 crore
The spat between Essar and Hutchison for the acquisition of BPL (Mumbai) circle is far from over with the Indian corporate maintaining that the Department of Telecom approval for acquisition of BPL shares is yet to come.
Experts argue that the cost savings both in terms of capex as well as operating costs can be substantial in the next one to two years.
Essar group now holds 77% stake in BPL Communications.
A PIL had sought probe into the Essar e-mail leak case.
Ahead of his scheduled meeting with Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin, who is bidding for Hutch-Essar, Communications Minister Dayanidhi Maran on Wednesday said the government wanted good companies to enter the country.
The Development Commissioners have recommended to the Board of Approval to cancel these SEZ projects.
Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari was on Friday at the centre of a controversy over reports that he and his family spent two nights on a luxury yacht owned by Essar group.
He supervised and handled several major big ticket insolvency cases that includes Essar Steel, Bhushan Power & Steel, Bhushan Steel, Jaypee Infratech, ElectroSteel Steel, Binani Cement, Reliance Communications.
Having lost the battle for Hutchison Essar, Anil Ambani-controlled Reliance Communications is drawing up plans to invest up to $2.5 billion.
Vodafone Essar on Thursday said it has crossed the 100-million subscriber mark in India, becoming the third mobile operator in the country to do so after rivals Bharti Airtel and Reliance communications.
The termination of the agreement for Mumbai does not affect the other three circles, for which a merger with Hutchison Essar has already been done.
Union Textile Minister Dayanidhi Maran has come under the scanner in the 2G scam probe, with the Central Bureau of Investigation telling the Supreme Court on Wednesday that he had misused his office and forced C Sivasankran, the promoter of Chennai-based Aircel, to sell his firm to Malaysia-based Maxis Communications in 2006.
Cross previous high of $72 billion in 2007 as Indian promoters overcome the selling taboo. Abhineet Kumar reports from Mumbai.
Bharti Airtel on Tuesday welcomed the decision of the directors of Vodafone to abstain from its board meeting, in view of the UK-based telecom major's interest in acquiring rival Hutch-Essar.
According to reports, the deal, if successful, could fetch Hutchison as much as $14 billion and would be Asia's largest private equity deal.
The race for Hutch-Essar, the country's fourth largest mobile service provider, quickened on Wednesday with Hong-Kong based Hutchison Telecommunications International Ltd formally informing the 4 companies in the fray to submit their bids by Friday
The British teleco is bidding hard for cellular operator Hutchison Essar. At stake: the world's fastest growing mobile market-and Vodafone's reputation.
Vodafone, which is yet to announce the acquisition, has offered to partner Essar, on which the Indian conglomerate said, "We are at the moment evaluating all our options in the best interest of the Group."
Reliance Communications, along with Malaysian telecom major Maxis, has confirmed its interest in picking up a stake in Hutchison Essar.
The exposure, which is for the period ended September 2019, is across various platforms such as life funds, pension funds, and unit-linked funds.
Reliance Communications chairman Anil Ambani on Thursday met Finance Minister P Chidambaram and senior DoT officials, even as his company started examining the books of Hutchison Essar Ltd for a possible bid.
Apple's decision to slash its entry-level iPhone (8 GB version) in the US market will not trickle down to India anytime soon.
The 40 per cent market share cap suggested by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) is likely to make mergers between existing telecom operators extremely tough.
