America Movil Seeks U.S. Carrier Bids

Carlos Slim of America Movil has contacted AT&T and SoftBank to see if they have any interest in purchasing the Mexican telecom company’s assets that could be worth up to $17.5 billion, Bloomberg reported. The sale would include America Movil infrastructure in a strip of states from north to south along Mexico’s eastern coast. America Movil has not yet asked for bids as the information given did not provide enough details for a company to make an offer, Bloomberg explained. However, Berge Ayvazian of 4G World and UBM Tech, previously explained, “One company with the size and ambition to compete with Slim is his former partner AT&T, which is showing new interest in expanding into Latin America. Carlos Slim recently acquired AT&T’s 8 percent stake in América Móvil for $5.6 billion, in part to help the US company secure regulatory approval in Latin America for its $48.5 billion acquisition of DirecTV. If regulatory approval is granted to acquire DirecTV, AT&T will become a partner of Televisa through the joint ownership of Sky Mexico, the satellite-TV company that competes with America Movil for Brazilian and Colombian pay TV subscribers. This could be a precursor to more direct completion between AT&T and America Movil. AT&T has declined to comment on a possible purchase of América Móvil assets, although its CEO has acknowledged that Televisa has also said that it was looking forward to exploring joint opportunities with AT&T in Mexico.”