Thai mobile operator Dtac announced an agreement to settle part of its long-running legal disputes with CAT Telecom. If approved by Dtac shareholders later this year at the AGM, Dtac would pay CAT THB 9.51 billion (USD 298 million) to CAT under the agreement.
The agreement does not cover all of their disputes, but does extend to all lawsuits pending, Dtac said. These cover disagreements over additional revenue sharing, CAT's claim that Dtac did not comply with a non-compete clause of their concession agreement and the expired concession agreement. However, the disputes to be settled do not include the disagreements over how the excise tax and interconnection charges are handled under the revenue-sharing deal.
Dtac's parent company Telenor said in a statement that the settlement would cover all but two of the disputes between the operators over the interpretation of the concession agreement, which ended in September 2018 after over 27 years. The two remaining issues are industry-wide matters, related to revenue sharing concerning excise tax and interconnection charges.
lf shareholders approve the partial settlement, Dtac will make a first payment of THB 6.84 billion to CAT and later pay the rest in small amounts as the relevant court cases are withdrawn. Dtac said the payments would not have any material negative impact on its liquidity and financial position.
Telenor has previously made provisions of around NOK 0.4 billion for some of the disputes in the settlement between Dtac and CAT. The remaining amount of around NOK 2.1 bn will be provided for in its Q4 2018 results as 'Other income and expenses'.
