Telecommunications unit will seek shareholder approval on March 9
Hutchison Telecommunications International will seek shareholder approval on March 9 for the sale of its 47 per cent stake in its Indian mobile business, Hutchison Essar Group, the company said in a transaction circular yesterday.
The sale, in which the Hutchison Essar stake is being bought by UK-based mobile operator Vodafone Group for HK$86.5 billion cash, is also subject to approval from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board of India's Ministry of Finance.
Hutchison Whampoa, which holds 49.66 per cent of Hutchison Telecom through various wholly owned subsidiaries, will vote in favour of the transaction at the extraordinary shareholders meeting next month, the circular said.
'[Hutchison Whampoa] has given the irrevocable undertakings to [Vodafone] to vote in favour of the resolution to be proposed to the shareholders at the meeting to approve the transaction,' Hutchison Telecom's chairman Canning Fok Kin-ning wrote in the circular's 'Letter from the board'.
'We need a simple majority of votes in favour of the transaction at the shareholders' meeting,' a Hutchison Telecom spokesperson said yesterday, adding that Hutchison Whampoa was able to cast the vote in the meeting.