France Telecom aims to buy a large stake in Vietnam's second-largest mobile phone service provider, MobiFone, state media quoted its chief executive as saying.
"We hope to participate with the highest stake possible," France Telecom CEO Didier Lombard was quoted by the Dau Tu (Investment) newspaper on Tuesday as saying.
"Vietnam is a market with potential for growth. Moreover, when we seek the partnership we aim to build a lasting relationship with a long-term vision," Lombard said in his first trip to Vietnam last week.
Mobifone said on Monday it had shortlisted six foreign firms which would bid to advise the state-run company on its partial privatisation, including an IPO expected in 2008.
MobiFone said Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Rothschild and UBS would bid to become the adviser for the Hanoi-based firm. It gave no timeframe for the bidding.
MobiFone, known formally as Vietnam Mobile Telecom Services Company and owned by Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications (VNPT), has said the IPO would take place early next year and VNPT would only hold one-third of the shares in MobiFone.
Strategic shareholders would have one third and outsiders the remaining stake, MobiFone's director Le Ngoc Minh said in May.
Foreign telecom giants including Vodafone and British Telecommunications Plc have said they wanted to be equity partners in the company.
MobiFone uses GSM technology and has about 8.5 million subscribers, or 35 percent share of the domestic market where it competes with military-run Viettel and state-run Vinaphone, which is also controlled by VNPT.
Privatising MobiFone, the first move in restructuring the telecommunications industry, was slow and difficult because Vietnam did not have a legal guide for the process, officials have said.
Source: Reuters
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