Orange in talks to buy Airtel subsidiaries in 4 African countries

For the quarter ended March, its revenues from africa declined 13 per cent year on year while net loss widened to $183 million.

Bharti Airtel has entered into exclusive talks with Orange to sell its businesses in four African countries: Burkina Faso, Chad, Congo Brazzaville and Sierra Leone.

At the end of 2014, Orange had 97.5 million clients in Africa and the Middle East, a regional customer base that the company is looking to increase rapidly.

French is one of the official languages in three of the four markets under negotiation. (See Orange Aims for 20% Sales Growth in Africa, Orange to Be All-IP by 2020, Says AMEA Boss and Eurobites: Orange Looks to North Africa.).

Airtel had entered the African market in 2010 after acquiring Zain Telecom for about $10.7 billion. As a result, Nomura Securities has called for a break-up or divestiture of its African business.

“This proposed acquisition is perfectly aligned with Orange’s strategy to continue growing in Africa and we believe that the acquisition of these four operators present a real interest for Orange”, added the spokesperson.

This sale, if goes through will help Airtel to refill it’s war-chest and focus on Mukesh Ambani’s re-entry into the Indian telecom space with Jio, which is expected to shake up the industry. It has long experience in the continent, and is building up massive scale there.

For Bharti, a disposal would raise funds as the New Delhi- based mobile-phone operator, India’s largest, invests to counter heavy competition for customers in its home market.