Qatar Telecom plans to launch a tender offer to lift its stake in Indonesia's second-largest mobile phone operator, PT Indosat Tbk, media presentation material issued by the Middle East investor showed on Monday. Qatar Telecom announced plans on Saturday to acquire Singapore Technology Telemedia's entire stake in Indosat for $1.35 billion. Qatar Telecom, which agreed to pay $1.8 billion to buy a stake in PT Indosat, Indonesia's second- biggest phone company, must offer to buy the rest of the company's shares, the Indonesian stock exchange said. Qatar Telecom on June 7 agreed to buy a 40.8 percent stake held by Asia Mobile Holdings Pte, its venture with Temasek Holdings Pte's Singapore Technologies Telemedia Pte. That triggered the need for Qatar Telecom to offer to buy rest of Indosat's shares, Erry Firmansyah, president director of Indonesia Stock Exchange, said in a telephone interview in Jakarta. An Indonesian district court ruled on May 9 Temasek, which has indirect holdings in Indosat and larger rival PT Telekomunikasi Selular through its units, broke antitrust laws and must sell its stake in either of Indonesia's two biggest mobile-phone operators within a year. Temasek has appealed to Indonesia's Supreme Court against the ruling. An investor that acquires a 25 percent stake or more in a publicly listed company must offer to buy the remaining shares from other shareholders, according to Indonesia's Capital Market and Financial Institution Supervisory Agency rules. Under the court ruling, Temasek's units can't sell more than 10 percent to a buyer and it can't be an affiliated company. Indosat's shares were suspended from trading in Jakarta. “What ST Telemedia and Qatar Telecom did is clearly an insult to Indonesia's law and legal proceedings,'' Mohammad Iqbal, a commissioner at Indonesia's Commission for Supervision of Business Competition said in an interview. “Qatar is an affiliated party with STT and Temasek as it has a stake in Asia Mobile.'' Melinda Tan, a spokeswoman for ST Telemedia, wrote in an e- mail to Bloomberg News the sale of the Indosat stake by Asia Mobile Holdings “is purely a business decision,'' and was subject to the outcome of the Supreme Court appeal. ST Telemedia controls 75 percent of Asia Mobile, while Qatar Telecom owns the rest. Temasek owns 54 percent of Singapore Telecommunications Ltd., which in turn holds 35 percent of Telekomunikasi Selular, or Telkomsel. A union representing workers from Indonesia's state- run enterprises filed a complaint against Temasek in December 2006, alleging the company was fixing call rates through its stakes in the two operators. The union withdrew the complaint in April 2007, without giving a reason. Still, Indonesia's competition regulator, known as KPPU, decided to continue the price-fixing probe and said on Nov. 19 that Temasek breached antitrust laws. Temasek has said its investments are based on commercial considerations and the boards and managements of ST Telemedia or STT, as well as Singapore Telecom, make their own decisions on their operations. Temasek and ST Telemedia have also repeatedly said they don't direct the operational decisions of Telkomsel and Indosat. Temasek has said it will take the case to international arbitration if Indonesia's courts don't rule in its favor. Qatar Telecom's planned purchase of the 40.8 percent stake of Indosat is equivalent to 7,385 rupiah a share, Bloomberg calculations show. Indosat stock last traded at 5,650 rupiah per share on June 6. Meanwhile, Qatar's sovereign wealth fund controlled nearly $65 billion in assets at the end of the first quarter of 2008 and a surge in its oil and gas income will boost the assets to nearly $105 billion in 2010, according to a bank. Higher revenues will also ally with a sharp increase in public spending to maintain high growth in the Gulf country's economy in the next few years, the Saudi British Bank (SABB) said in a study on Qatar. From about $65 billion at the end of March, the assets of the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) are expected to surge by $30 billion to nearly $105 billion in 2010, the SABB study was quoted as saying in an Emirates Business report. Within Qatar, QIA has a 50 percent shareholding in the state-controlled Qatar National Bank and owns 50 percent of Qatar Telecom.
