TALLINN - TeliaSonera AB Sweden's largest telephone company, has offered 4.89 billion kronor (490.8 million euros) to buy out the other shareholders of its Estonian and Lithuanian telecoms units. The bid is split between AS Eesti Telekom, at 3.33 billion kronor in cash, and 1.56 billion kronor for remaining shares in the Lithuanian company TEO LT AB, reports news agency Bloomberg.
TeliaSonera entered the Baltic countries in 1991 and has said its aim is to take control of its subsidiaries in the region, as they are regarded to be part of its home market.
International asset management company Danske Capital, a unit of Denmark's Danske Bank, said in an e-mailed statement that it doesn't plan to accept TeliaSonera's offer because the price doesn't reflect the true value of the companies. Danske Capital said it is 'astonished' at the TeliaSonera bid. "We feel TeliaSonera is simply trying to take advantage of the recent poor market sentiment in Estonia and Lithuania by offering this insufficient compensation to minority shareholders," said Danske Capital fund manager Jaakko Salmelin.
The Baltic operators "would benefit in future development and investments from TeliaSonera's strong financial position," as well as from access to the Swedish company's research and development, says TeliaSonera Chief Executive Officer Lars Nyberg.
TeliaSonera also owns the Omnitel mobile service in Lithuania and a majority of Latvijas Mobilais Telefons shares in Latvia, according to its Web site.
TeliaSonera's offer for the remaining shares in Eesti Telekom will begin on September 9 and will end on October 9, 2009. The offer price is 28.5 percent higher than the weighted average share price of Eesti Telekom over the past 180 days, and exceeds the closing price on the stock exchange on August 21 by 24.3 per cent.
TeliaSonera owns 60.12 percent of Eesti Telekom and 60 percent of TEO LT.
