Anil Ambani, the billionaire chairman of India's Reliance Communications , may link up with private equity groups in a bid to gain a powerful foothold in sub-Saharan Africa's biggest mobile phone operator MTN , the Financial Times said on Wednesday. Quoting people familiar with the situation, the FT said private equity groups had expressed interest in supporting Ambani's plan to swap all or most of his majority stake in Reliance, India's No.2 mobile operator, for up to 34.9 percent of MTN. “These are people who are all interested in telecoms and emerging markets, therefore this deal is an obvious place for them to invest,” the paper quoted a person familiar with the potential tie-up as saying. A combination of MTN, valued at $35.6 billion at Tuesday's close, and Reliance, valued at $26.9 billion, would create a top 10 global industry company to rival Japan's NTT DoCoMo […]

As part of its backward integration plans, Sujana Metal Products Ltd (SMPL) is planning to diversify into iron ore mining. The company, which is on an expansion spree, is looking for another spate of acquisitions to take up its capacity to one million tonne per annum (tpa) by 2010, from the current 7,28,000 tpa. V S R Murthy, group director, Sujana Group of Companies, said, “We are very close to acquiring a Hyderabad-based company, which has a sponge iron manufacturing facility of 67,000 tpa.” He said the Hyderabad-based company, whose name he refused to divulge, already has iron ore linkage at Bellary in Karnataka, has a total capacity of up to 30 million tonne. SMPL would close the deal in the next three months. After acquisition, it would expand the capacity of the acquired company to 1,00,000 tpa. […]

Goldman Sachs and India's Shriram Credit have called off an agreement, which would have given the U.S. investment bank a 20 percent holding in the Indian firm, the Times of India said on Monday. Goldman had signed the deal in March to buy the stake for 3 billion rupees in the non-banking financial services company that would have given Goldman an indirect entry into the equity and commodity brokerage business in India. “Goldman Sachs is among those assessing the losses they would incur because of the subprime issue. They were delaying things here and we said drop it,” the newspaper quoted Shriram group Chairman R. Thiagarajan as saying. A spokesman for Goldman declined comment on the report, while Shriram was not immediately available. Citing sources familiar with deal, the newspaper said the deal failed after Goldman wanted to scale down the valuation. Under the deal the Shriram group was to transfer the brokerage and distribution services business to Shriram Credit, the paper said.(Reuters) […]

Sterlite Industries on Saturday agreed to buy the operating assets of bankrupt copper miner Asarco for $2.6 billion, the latest in the series of overseas acquisitions by Indian firms. Tuscon-based Asarco, the third largest copper maker in U.S. had total revenue of $1.9 billion in 2007, Sterlite, a unit of Vedanta Resources Plc said in a statement. “Asarco is a strategic fit with Sterlite's existing copper business,” the Indian firm said in the statement. On Friday a lawyer close to the deal had told Reuters in New York that Vedanta had signed a $2.6 billion deal to buy the assets of Asarco. Asarco, formerly known as American Smelting and Refining Co, produced 235,000 tonnes of refined copper in 2007 and its mines have an estimated reserve of 5 million tonnes of contained copper. It filed for bankruptcy protection in 2005 after it was sued for $1 billion over environmental and asbestos claim. Sterlite, is India's top non-ferrous metals and mining firm with interests in aluminium, copper, zinc and lead. […]

The Emami Group has acquired 27.51% stake in ayurvedic products major Zandu Pharmaceutical Works, taking its total stake in the company to over 31.41%. An open offer will follow the acquisition. The personal care products firm may not be done yet: it is looking at more buyouts both in the domestic as well as international markets. Harsh V Agarwal, director, Emami Group, told DNA Money that talks are on with at least 3-4 more companies. “We are interested in the personal care, household and healthcare sectors.” Emami already held a 3.9% stake in Zandu. On May 28, the company acquired another 14.81% stake and on Friday, topped this up by buying 12.7% from one of the promoter groups. That makes it mandatory for Emami to make an offer for 20% according to the Securities and Exchange Board of India regulations. […]