Bharti Airtel, India’s biggest mobile-phone company, and South Africa’s MTN Group reached a $24bn preliminary accord to buy each other’s shares, the first step in a planned merger, reports Bloomberg. Bharti sweetened its bid to buy 49% of MTN by raising the cash portion of its $14bn, said people close to the deal, adding that MTN and its shareholders are set to buy 33% of Bharti for about $10bn.

This entry was posted by Gwen Robinson on Thursday, September 10th, 2009 at 5:05 and is filed under Capital markets, M&A. Tagged with bharti airtel, MTN. Edit this entry.