Don’t get shocked, this was just a rumor, and industry insiders have denied this news in any case. However, TheTechthurtle today morning claimed that UK based Vodafone and Orascom have closed a deal to sell 26% shares of Pakistan’s largest cellular company Mobilink to Vodafone. Blog, without citing any source, claims that both the companies were in talks for quite some time now, however, the deal was closed recently. No words were said regarding the value of deal; hence the total value of Mobilink is still unknown.
It was said that Vodafone had been seeking its chance to enter Pakistani cellular market to further strengthen its regional existence for last three years and at the same time Mobilink was eying any investor to share the investment injection.
TheTechthurtle writes that Vodafone has already setup their office in Islamabad since 2006 and living a life of anonymity.
Vodafone owns cellular operations in 20 countries globally. And the trend observed is that they enjoy sole ownership of companies. They have 52 percent as their least number of shares in any network in India. If the rumor is true then it can be depicted that Vodafone may have asked Mobilink for at least 50 percent shares. In another scenario, Waird has been enjoying 30 percent sleeping partner, Singtel. But Vodafone has got an attitude to rule independently, like we saw in India; they rebranded Hutch throughout India in a campagn called as World’s largest rebranding
Another rumor was spread in the same post, that Orascom’s Internet wing, Link Dot Net, was also in talks with another UK telco Orange to sell it partial shares. Blogger writes that Link Dot Net is in serious trouble due to their weak infrastructure and poor planning.
