Airtel to simplify shareholding structure in foreign arms

New Delhi: Telecom major Bharti Airtel on Wednesday said it is restructuring shareholding pattern of foreign subsidiaries to simplify structure and bring in synergies between the companies.

"The Board of Directors...Approved the company's investments in its wholly-owned subsidiaries Bharti Airtel International (Mauritius) Ltd (BAIM), Bharti Airtel International (Netherlands) B.V. (BAIN), Netherlands and Bharti International (Singapore) Pte Ltd (BISPL), Singapore will be held entirely by Network i2i Ltd (Ni2i), Mauritius, another wholly-owned subsidiary of the company," Bharti Airtel said in a regulatory filing.

It further said: "BAIN will continue to hold the shareholding in African operating companies and the company's investments in its wholly-owned subsidiaries Bharti Airtel (USA) Ltd, Bharti Airtel (Hong Kong) Ltd and Bharti Airtel (UK) Ltd will be help entirely by BISPL, another wholly-owned subsidiary of the company".

Elaborating on restructuring, it said: "The resultant 'vertical step by step shareholding structure' envisaged by the above restructuring aims to offer number of benefits including delayering and simplification of structure and synergies without any change in ultimate ownership over the said subsidiaries".

Shares of the company were trading 1.04 per cent down at Rs 348.50 apiece on BSE.