Interest in the take over of Satyam has been increasing as the company is seen as stabilising under the aegis of the board of directors appointed by the government.
Tarun Das, a government nominee to the board and the chief mentor of the CII, said as many as seven suitors, including private equity players, were keen on taking over the management of Satyam Computer Services.
"So far we are aware of four (companies that have approached Satyam Computer). But we have heard that another two or three firms are also interested," Das said.
The Satyam board has appointed Goldman Sachs and Avendus Capital as investment bankers and mandated Boston Consulting Group to be its management adviser. These appointments are said to be a move aimed at evaluating in detail the offers made to Satyam.
The government has stated earlier that it is not interested in breaking up the company and selling it in parts.
Potential suitors
L&T has been in the race from day one. Even before Raju's confession led to mayhem, L&T was said to be funding Satyam albeit behind the scenes.
L&T has, by now, already acquired 12 per cent in the company. It has also been lobbying heavily with satyam's institutional investors, lenders, the government and the Satyam board. L&T Infotech, is a mid size company and Satyam will give it leap into the big league.
In September 2008, top executive and long-time Wipro employee, Sudip Banerjee, quit Premji Investments to join L&T's IT subsidiary, L&T Infotech, as CEO.
Banerjee, who joined Wipro in 1983, was the president of enterprise solutions at Wipro Technologies, the global IT services arm of the firm. He quit shortly after Suresh Vaswani, who headed the India and West Asia IT arm of Wipro, and Girish Paranjpe, president of Wipro Technologies Financial Solutions were elevated as co-chief executives of Wipro.
If L&T takes control of Satyam, it is likely that Banerjee will be heading Satyam.
iGate, promoted by Phaneesh Murthy, has also announced its interest in a buyout of Satyam. iGate is waiting for the newly-formed board to come out with a clear financial statement indicating the numbers.
iGate would value Satyam on the basis of its assets and customer base, once it ghets a clear idea baout its labilities. Murthy, a former Infosys senior employee left the company after a sexual harassment-suit by a former employee in the US.
Spice group has emerged a surprise contender for the bidding of Satyam. Spice Group chairman B K Modi confirmed that Spice Innovation is interested in acquiring 51-per cent stake in Satyam and has already put in a formal bid . The rationale behind the move is that Satyam has similar business interests as Spice.
The company prefers a preferential allotment route than buying shares on the open market, so that money can enter the company rather than the market.
Spice Group has diversified operations including mobile handset manufacturing, mobile software development, back-office operations, entertainment and retail.
General Atlantic may team up with Patni Computers for a joint bid. Another contender is Texas Pacific Group.
Fidelity Investments bought a 2.5-per cent stake in the IT firm on 29 January 2009.
Two funds managed by Fidelity bought 17.13 million shares of Satyam Computer Services for Rs91.5 crore ($18.7 million) in block deals, at a weighted average price of Rs53.4, data available with the National Stock Exchange showed. Fidelity owned 3.41 per cent of Satyam as of December but sold it in the wake of the scam, according to stock exchange filings.
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