Omantel ‘Flagging’

Omani incumbent Omantel is interested in acquiring an equity stake in FLAG Telecom, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Indian giant Reliance Communications. FLAG is seeking to divest up to 20% of its share capital to raise USD200 million. It is considering laying a submarine cable between Oman and Africa and earlier entered into a deal with Omantel to provide IP-based services via this link. There are three other interested parties in the FLAG stake; Temasek, the Singaporean government’s investment arm is one; the other two have not been disclosed.