DUBAI: Telecom operator Zain wants to retain majority control of its Bahraini subsidiary after the unit’s initial public offering, but has yet to agree the exact terms of the share sale, the Kuwaiti firm’s chief executive said yesterday.
Zain Bahrain must float 15 percent of its shares and list on Bahrain’s bourse by year-end. Zain holds a 56.3 percent stake in the company, so Zain would no longer be majority owner should existing shareholders be required to sell shares in the IPO on a proportional basis.
“We’re still having a discussion as to whether it will be (a) primary or secondary (listing) and what the dilution factor will be,” Scott Gegenheimer, Zain’s chief executive told reporters on the sidelines of a conference in Dubai. “We prefer not to go below 50 percent because we want to make sure we stay with a controlling interest.”
Zain Bahrain’s other shareholders include Chairman Sheikh Ahmed bin Ali Abdulla Al Khalifa, owner of a 16.3 percent stake, and Vodafone, which holds 6.1 percent, according to Zawya, a Thomson Reuters company.
Bahrain’s second mobile licence was awarded to Zain in 2003 — ending Batelco monopoly — and the unit had planned to launch an IPO in 2008, only for the share sale to be abandoned. Zain Bahrain’s licence stipulates it must conduct an IPO within a decade of the licence award, Gegenheimer said. “We’re doing everything we can to fulfil the requirements of the licence,” he said.
Reuters
