Auckland-based Telecom New Zealand, the country’s largest phone operator and second largest company, has sold its stake in Australia’s Macquarie Telecom. It is also considering offers for its stake in AAPT.
TNZ exited its investment in Macquarie with a…
Auckland-based Telecom New Zealand, the country’s largest phone operator and second largest company, has sold its stake in Australia’s Macquarie Telecom. It is also considering offers for its stake in AAPT.
TNZ exited its investment in Macquarie with a small profit of A$400,000 (US$360,770) over the A$9.5m (US$8.57m) acquisition price.
In 2007, TNZ bought PowerTel for $A357m (US$322m), folding the new acquisition into AAPT.
With this TNZ inherited PowerTel’s 10% stake in Macquarie, plus its 17.4% stake in iiNet, which TNZ still holds, valued at around A$13.3m (US$12m).
The New Zealand operator has been hawking its share in AAPT, Australia’s third-biggest telecommunications company since May, but with little success. The grand dream was to expand its operations into the much bigger Australian market. However, it found itself running into a brick wall in market dominated by Telsta and Optus and has had to retreat across the Tasman Sea in the face of rising costs and falling revenues.
Local newspaper, The New Zealand Herald, speculated that Australian Internet provider iiNet was close to a deal to buy AAPT’s consumer business, after an offer from TPG Telecom for the entire company fell through.
The Australian Stock Exchange announced that iiNet had requested a halt in the trade of its shares. An ASX statement read: “The company requests a two day trading halt, and envisions making an announcement to the ASX concerning the proposed transaction prior to the market opening on Monday, August 2 which will lift the trading halt.”
TNZ’s other major Australian asset is its 5% stake in Vodafone-Hutchison Australia, trading as Vodafone Australia.
The stake, worth around $A150m (US$135.5m), is something of an accident of history, coming about after Hutchison Telecommunications, 10% owned by TNZ after a $A400m (US$361) deal designed to cement a never-realized 3G alliance – merged with Vodafone Australia last year.
