A consortium led by Citic Capital Holdings has agreed to acquire the US-listed Chinese telecom billing and software company, AsiaInfo-Linkage, for $890 million.
The deal, which has been in talks since January 2012, would offer AsiaInfo-Linkage shareholders $12 per share for their stock, representing a 52% premium over the closing price the day prior to receiving Citic Capital’s take-private proposal in 2012, the company said.
AsiaInfo-Linkage's board of directors has approved the merger agreement and will recommend shareholders vote in favor of it when they meet, but a date hasn't been set yet.
The acquisition will be funded through a $300 million loan offered by Bank of Taiwan, Cathay United Bank, ICBC International Capital Limited, Maybank Investment Bank and Nomura International (Hong Kong) Limited.
The consortium was led by Citi and Edward Tian, co-founder and a significant stockholder of AsiaInfo-Linkage, as well as affiliates CITIC PE, China Broadband Capital Partners.
Beijing-based AsiaInfo-Linkage provides a full suite of OSS and BSS solutions to telcos. The vendor said its core Veris product line includes billing and customer care systems that serve nearly a billion subscribers globally.
In China, AsiaInfo-Linkage has more than 50% market share in billing, CRM and business intelligence through longstanding partnerships with China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom, the company claimed.