Telenor is seeking allies among Vimpelcom's minority shareholders to thwart the Russian operator's proposed takeover of Wind, and has offered the prospect of an extra dividend from Vimpelcom if the deal failed. Telenor faces an uphill battle to convince more than 70 percent of independent Vimpelcom owners to reject the Wind deal at a shareholders' meeting scheduled for 17 March. With 36 percent of Vimpelcom's voting stock, Telenor has said the purchase of Wind makes no strategic or financial sense. In a letter sent to Vimpelcom shareholders on 2 March, and obtained by Reuters, the Norwegian operator said if the deal failed it would seek an extraordinary payout of at least USD 1 per share on top of any regular dividend. A better alternative for all shareholders is the payment of an extraordinary dividend, Telenor said in the letter that calls on Vimpelcom shareholders to reject the deal. Telenor is seeking to regain the initiative after a London court this week denied its injunction to stop the vote. Vimpelcom rejected Telenor's plan to pay an additional USD 1.3 billion in dividend on top of the USD 850 million it already paid out last year and with a final 2010 dividend still to follow, calling it a "self-interested" and a "not serious" proposal. An additional payment, as proposed by Telenor, would effectively shrink the company and deprive it of the significant growth opportunities it was created to undertake, Vimpelcom spokeswoman Elena Prokhorova told Reuters. Telenor's head of mergers and acquisitions, Torbjoern Wist, said he has had positive feedback from meetings with Vimpelcom's financial shareholders, who jointly hold 19.3 percent of voting stock.
