Indian Billionaire Gautam Adani Makes Hostile Takeover Bid for NDTV
Naman Ramachandran Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, chair of the $240 billion Adani Group, is in the process of making a hostile takeover bid for New Delhi Television (NDTV), one of the country’s most trusted news sources. On Tuesday, Adani’s AMG Media Networks Limited (AMNL) acquired some 29% of NDTV indirectly, by buying out loans to the company. The value of the transaction was not disclosed. AMNL also made an open offer to acquire a further 26% of NDTV, but at INR294 ($3.68) per share, a discount of 20% on the company’s existing share value. NDTV said in a statement that the loan buyout “was executed without any input from, conversation with, or consent of the NDTV founders, who, like NDTV, have been made aware of this exercise of rights only today. As recently as yesterday, NDTV had informed the stock exchanges that there was no change in the shareholding of its founders.”