In the past couple of years, WorldCall has made a record of deals that have never been taken to their logical conclusion. This was proven yet once again as another deal between WorldCall Services (Private) Limited and minority shareholders expired yesterday.
Arif Habib Limited, the manager of the deal, disclosed to the stock exchange that the public offer of WorldCall Services (Private) Ltd has expired without any major development.
In March this year, WorldCall Services (Private) Ltd approached WorldCall Telecom through public intention offer of buying a further 185 million of shares (21.6%) at the value of Rs 2.69 per share (which translates into Rs 500 million in total).
The offer was being made to various minority shareholders of WorldCall Telecom which waited to be approved during May 1st to 7th. The deal was a separate exercise of sale-purchase of shares from the previous one which was signed last year by the same company.
Earlier, the management failed to make share sale-purchase deals with Dunya Group and PTCL.
In October 2016, WorldCall Services entered into a share purchase agreement with Oman Telecommunications Company (S.A.O.G.), the major shareholder of WorldCall Telecom, for the purchase of 488 million ordinary shares (56.80%) at a price of Rupees 0.00000020 per ordinary share.
Oman Telecommunication owns majority shares totaling 56.80 percent in WorldCall Telecom. It is followed by public and private sector companies with 11.9% shareholding and commercial banks and DFIs with 5.59 percent shares. 25 percent shares are owned by the general public through the stock exchange.
It was being expected that WorldCall Telecom may become more financially viable in comparison to its current status. It is also expected that the new owners will have better managerial planning. Consequently, WorldCall Services may be able to pass on parts of the expected benefits to the other stakeholders such as the Government, employees, general body of consumers and the society at large.
WorldCall Telecom, one of the oldest telecom operators, has been facing serious financial and operational issues, which has resulted in non-payment of salaries and customers getting poor quality of services.
