Rating: Coffers nice and full now
The Vodafone Group has just put out a statement on Indian tax case judgment which has gone massively in the operator’s favour. The judgment of the Indian Supreme Court is that Vodafone had no liability to account for withholding tax on its acquisition of interests in Hutchison Essar Limited in 2007. Hutchison Essar is now Vodafone India Limited, of course. If the company has lost the case it could have been liable for as much as £2.8 billion ($4.4 billion). The news not only validates Vodafone’s investment in one of the all-important BRIC [Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries where future cellular growth is concentrated, it also helps the company's coffers.
Curiously, although India accounted for 9 per cent of the firm's total revenues in the six months to 30 September [2011], Vodafone actually lost £9 million.
However, Vodafone India saw an increase in revenues of some 18.4 per cent during that same period.
Formerly the No.1 mobile operator, Vodafone is now one of the world’s largest mobile communications companies by revenue.
It can boast 391 million customers as of 30 September 2011 and has interests in over 30 countries across five continents plus than 40 partner networks worldwide.
Now that gives the company some tremendous clout when negotiating with its suppliers and GoMo News favours the theory that Vodafone might make a move in the US market.
See our previous story here. This prediction says that Vodafone might buy a big US based GSM operator. Which has to be T-Mobile USA or AT&T, really.
Those who think Vodafone is too small for this shouldn’t forget that Vodafone pulled off one of the biggest take-over surprises when it took control of Mannesman back in 2000.
