To shake the telecom market, Idea Cellular Ltd. owned by Aditya Birla Group has completed the procedure of merge with Vodafone. Together, they have created the country’s largest mobile services operator with over 408 million subscribers. Now, the new board has been constituted for the merged entity ‘Vodafone Idea Ltd’. Know more.
This board will have with 12 directors (including six independent directors). It has Kumar Mangalam Birla as its Chairman. Balesh Sharma has been designated as the CEO. It is positioned #1 in nine telecom circles. This new company will have all India revenue market share of 32.2 per cent. The combined entity will have a broadband network of 3.4 lakh sites and distribution network with 17 lakh retail outlets. To cover over 1.2 billion Indians (92 per cent population coverage), it has Largest voice network with over 200,000 unique GSM sites4.
Financial details
Going into the details of this merger, it is expected to generate Rs. 14,000 crore annual synergy, including opex synergies of Rs. 8,400 crore, equivalent to a net present value of approximately Rs. 70,000 crore,” the statement said. On 30th June, 2018, the net debt was INR 1,092 billion. In terms of equity, it was infusion of Rs. 6,750 crore at Idea and Rs. 8,600 crore at Vodafone, coupled with monetisation of standalone towers of both companies for an enterprise value of Rs. 7,850 crore.
This merger aims at giving a tough competition to Reliance Jio. It is known that the aggressive entry of Reliance Jio blow Indian telecom market away.
