Bharti Airtel Buys 4.5% Stake In Bharti Infratel

On Wednesday, Bharti Airtel Ltd, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Nettle Infrastructure Investments Ltd, acquired an additional stake of 13.30 crore shares or 4.94% in tower company Bharti Infratel Ltd for Rs 2,882.32 crore, according to its stock exchange filing.

Prior to the acquisition, Bharti Airtel and Nettle Infrastructure held 23.04% and 13.69%, respectively, in Bharti lnfratel. With this acquisition, Nettle's stake increased to 18.62%.

The aggregate shareholding of Bharti Airtel and Nettle in Bharti Infratel has increased from 36.73% to 41.66%.

Shares of Bharti Airtel and Bharti Infratel opened higher at Rs 489.15 and Rs 226.80, respectively, on Thursday.

The stake was acquired from private equity firm Providence Equity Parners, which sold 77.08 million shares for an average of Rs 215.44, aggregating to Rs 1,660.61 crore.

These were held through P5 Asia Holding Investments Mauritius Ltd and EdgePoint Global Portfolio and EdgePoint Growth & Income Portfolio, which sold 31.21 million and 18.11 million shares, respectively, for Rs 672.83 crore and Rs 390.44 crore.

"Since the acquisition has been undertaken on the stock exchange, the same does not fall within the purview of 'related party transactions'," Bharti Airtel said.