Word: mci
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...they ever. Just ask MCI. In a bid that would mark the biggest corporate buyout in U.S. history, the country boy from Canada by way of Mississippi last week offered $30 billion in WorldCom stock for MCI, the country's second largest long-distance carrier and a company four times the size of WorldCom. The bid demolished British Telecommunication's $18.7 billion offer for MCI just as the two phone giants were preparing to seal their transatlantic deal. It also shattered BT's plan to make the MCI merger the focus of its global strategy, a consequence that didn...
...swapping its consumer subscribers for the hookups of America Online. That gave WorldCom, which has made some 50 acquisitions in little more than a decade, a broader range of telecom assets--from local and long-distance lines to high-speed Internet-access networks--than even mighty AT&T. Adding MCI would balloon WorldCom's revenues from $4.5 billion in 1996 to nearly $28 billion and make the company, based in Jackson, Miss., by far the leading challenger to the $52.7 billion colossus once known as Ma Bell. "With all of his transactions," says Berge Ayvazian, executive vice president...
...fashioned WorldCom into the very model of a 21st century telecom empire. Ebbers "sees the industry at a historic turning point," Sidgmore says. "That's why WorldCom is moving so quickly. "We've made big bets and moved faster than anybody else." Indeed, even as Ebbers was bidding for MCI last week, WorldCom was unveiling a $2.9 billion buyout of Brooks Fiber Properties, which provides local phone service to business customers in more than 30 U.S. cities...
...company won't have to put up a single penny to buy MCI. Instead, it will issue 820 million new shares and exchange them for MCI's. Investors normally head for the exit in the face of this kind of dilution. But WorldCom's share increased 10% last Thursday and finished trading at $37.95 a share on Friday, up $1.63 for the week. "The more we looked at the numbers, the more we were shocked at how positive [an MCI deal] was," says Sidgmore. Among other advantages, a merger would give WorldCom control of an estimated...
...that the MCI acquisition is by any means a done deal. MCI management, led by chairman Bert Roberts, had not been heard from as of the end of last week. MCI shareholders will get a chance to vote on the rival offers, and BT could choose to raise its bid, although it can ill afford a bidding war. BT, whose shareholders were unhappy with the MCI deal, may simply decide to walk away. That would leave the company's global strategy adrift but provide a nice $1.3 billion profit on its MCI investment. "The player who benefits most from WorldCom...