BT boss brokered sale of key stake to Indian tycoon Sunil Bharti Mittal
BT boss brokered sale of key stake to Indian tycoon Sunil Bharti Mittal
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The boss of BT helped broker the sale of nearly a quarter of the business to Indian billionaire Sunil Bharti Mittal, The. Mail on Sunday understands. Allison Kirkby, who took over as head of the telecoms giant last February, arranged the crunch talks where a deal was struck for the sale of the 24.5 per cent of BT held by French tycoon Patrick Drahi, according to a source.
The intervention last summer was said to have come amid rising fears that Drahi could be forced into a fire sale of his stake to help pay down a £47 billion debt pile at his Altice conglomerate. Drahi appears to have been caught off-guard when rising interest rates caused his debt bill to soar. Altice was also struggling after a corruption investigation into its activities in Portugal.
'You don't want a distressed seller with a stake of that size,' the source said. Eventually, a deal to sell Drahi's stake to Bharti was agreed in August. The price tag was not disclosed, though the size of the stake is now about £3.4 billion. Towering ambition: BT boss Allison Kirkby helped to arrange the sale of the shares to Sunil Bharti Mittal.
It is unusual for a chief executive to engage in talks about shareholder structure, as they usually focus on the day-to-day running of the business. The task is usually left to the chairman. While Kirkby may have helped foster the talks, the source said chairman Adam Crozier had been 'very much aware and involved' with the deal.
