Reliance Communications/Aircel Re650 billion merger

Overview:

• Reliance Communications (RCOM) and Aircel have announced a merger to create India's fourth-largest phone company in terms of customer base and revenues.
• Aircel is the mobile business owned by Maxis Communications (MCB).
• RCOM and MCB will each hold 50% of the merged company with equal board and committee representation. 
• The merged company will have combined assets of $9.7 billion and net worth of $5.2 billion. 
• The transaction is likely to be closed in early 2017, subject to regulatory, court and shareholder approvals. 
• J Sagar Associates (JSA) (Sandeep Mehta, Rajesh Pal, Manav Raheja, Nitin Kala, Malav Shah, Aarti Iyer, Prannoy Semwal, Ashrafi Ginwala, Malini Rao) acted for Reliance Communications.
• Slaughter and May (Simon Nicholls, Murray Cox, Harry Hecht, Raghav Ghai, James Foster) is advising RCOM as international counsel.
• Khaitan & Co (Haigreve Khaitan, Niren Patel, Mehul Shah) is advising Aircel.
• Kirkland & Ellis (Gavin Gordon, David Arnold, Aprajita Dhundia, Srinivas Kaushik, Ian Kirwan) is acting as international counsel for Aircel.
• Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (Cyril Shroff, Radhika Gaggar) is acting for Aircel’s indirect minority shareholders Sindya Securities & Investments, which holds the minority stake in Aircel through Deccan Digital Networks.

Wai Yee Tsang - Journalist - Asia-Pacific