Bharti Airtel’s African arm Airtel Africa on Monday announced appointment of global banks, including JP Morgan, Citigroup, BofA Merrill Lynch, Barclays, BNP Paribas and Goldman Sachs, for its intended IPO on an international stock exchange.
Airtel Africa has operations in 14 countries offering 2G, 3G and 4G voice and data services as well as mobile commerce through Airtel Money. Monday’s announcement follows the steps being taken by Bharti Airtel for listing of its African operations subsidiary.
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In October, a group of six global investors led by Warburg Pincus, Temasek, Singtel and SoftBank Group International announced investment of $1.25 billion (around Rs 9,141 crore) through a primary equity issuance in Airtel Africa. The funds will be used to retire part of its around $5-billion debt and for expansion of operations. The deal pegs its post-money equity value at $4.4 billion and enterprise value at $8.15 billion.
Earlier this month, Airtel Africa constituted its new board of directors, which includes representatives from Bharti Airtel and investors. “The new board of directors brings a wealth of industry and governance experience to further drive the Airtel Africa business,” Airtel said.
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For the July-September quarter, the company’s revenue in constant currency terms grew 11% Y-o-Y to $824 million, led by a growth in data and Airtel Money transaction value. Mobile data traffic grew 53% Y-o-Y to 89 billion MB. Data customers rose 32.1% to 27.1 million. The customer base of Airtel Money increased to 12.9 million, boosting the total transaction value on the platform by 31% Y-o-Y to $6.3 billion.