Sprint and SoftBank Tweak Deal; Sprint Disses Dish
Jun 10, 2013, 8:21 PM by Eric M. Zeman
Sprint and SoftBank today announced an amendment to their original merger agreement that makes the deal more attractive to current Sprint investors. Chiefly, SoftBank is upping the amount of cash it will pay to investors by $4.5 billion to a total of $16.64 billion. The amount of cash being pumped into the front-end of the deal is being offset by a $3 billion reduction in the $4.9 billion investment SoftBank planned to make in New Sprint after the acquisition was completed, as well as new financing on SoftBank's part. The companies together believe that reworking the finances is a win for Sprint's shareholders and reflects Sprint's Network Vision progress and profitability improvements. However, once the deal is done, Sprint's current shareholders will have 22% ownership of the company, and SoftBank will have 78%. Under the previous terms, SoftBank would have had a 70% stake in Sprint. Separate from altering the SoftBank transaction terms, Sprint today also announced that its Special Committee evaluating Dish Networks' proposal has concluded that Dish's deal is no good. "We have expended substantial time and energy engaging with Dish over the past nine weeks, including an extensive due diligence process, but these efforts did not lead, in the Special Committee's view, to a proposal that was reasonably likely to lead to a proposal superior to SoftBank's," said Sprint. In light of these changes, Sprint has delayed its planned June 12 shareholder vote to June 25. Most U.S. regulatory bodies, including the Justice Department, SEC, and FBI, have approved SoftBank's proposed equity acquisition of Sprint. It is now awaiting review from the Federal Communications Commission.
Comments
REALLY
So, I could just be horrendous at math, but it seems to me that if you cut a $4.9 billion dollar investment by $3 billion, to instead give that money to shareholders in cash, reducing the investment in Sprint to $1.9 billion, is JUST a win for shareholders, and not so much a reflection on Network Vision progress... then again, that's going terribly, so maybe this was stated pretty precisely. Profitability improvements too, sure you invest less and the lackluster profits remain the same, i'd call that a profitability improvement versus what the write off might have be...
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carmodboy99 said:
...and not so much a reflection on Network Vision progress... then again, that's going terribly, so maybe this was stated pretty precisely.
Network Vision is actually progressing quite well. You n...
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Soap opera.
Cant wait for the ball to get rolling on this though.
Still waiting to hear about Clearwire
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NTT Docomo Tried this in the 2000's
and lost billions
Maybe softbank should look back at then since I'm Having Deja vu , and Dan Hesse was part of that Deal 2 , Wasn't He? 😲