56 2GM Saturday December 4 2021 | the times
Business
5
On stage on the 17th floor of BT’s new
headquarters, with the City of London
skyline behind him, Philip Jansen and
his executive team used a two-hour
Didi Global quits New York
months after market float
Martin StrydomA Chinese ride-hailing company is to
delist from the New York Stock
Exchange less than six months after
raising $4.4 billion in a float and instead
will list in Hong Kong.
Didi Global’s move comes after a
crackdown on technology companies
in China that wiped billions off its
valuation when it pushed ahead with its
initial public offering on Wall Street
despite being asked by Chinese regula-
tors to put the float on hold.
Days after its stock market debut on
June 30, the Cyberspace Administra-
tion of China ordered app stores to
remove 25 mobile apps operated by
Didi and told the company to stop
registering new users, citing national
security and the public interest. Didi
remains under investigation.
The crackdown on Didi and other
companies in China alarmed investorsand has led to a sell-off in Chinese tech-
nology stocks. Didi’s shares dropped by
a quarter on the day the regulator acted
and have continued to fall. They slid
further last week after reports that
Chinese regulators had asked it to
formulate a plan to delist in America
and yesterday lost another $1.73, or
22.2 per cent, to close at $6.07, far from
the $14 float price.
Didi said on its Twitter-like Weibo
account: “Following careful research,
the company will immediately start de-
listing on the New York stock exchange
and start preparations for listing in
Hong Kong.” It said later that its board
had approved the move to pursue a list-
ing on the Hong Kong exchange and
would organise a shareholders’ meet-
ing to vote on the move.
China is Didi’s largest market, with
377 million of its 493 million annual
active users. It was founded there nine
years ago.BT may sell its television sport sectionday that this week’s manifesto event
had showcased the importance of fibre
connectivity and that the government
would scrutinise any bid for all or part
of the company as it was a critical asset
at the “heart of Britain’s digital future.
“If [Drahi] is looking to make a bold
move, takeover move, he needs to be
assured. This is a sort of ‘golden share-
type’ situation where you would [need]
the go-ahead from government and
regulators.” The shareholder addedBT vulnerable to takeover as
Philip Jansen calls the
telecoms company a
national champion
amid talk of foreign bid,
reports Alex Ralph
years of heavy operational lifting
centred on big cost-cutting and BT
Openreach’s commitment to build full-
fibre broadband infrastructure to
25 million premises.
BT’s management, which is consider-
ing selling its Sport division, has
pledged that after briefly suspending
the dividend, a triennial review of its
pension fund and repairing relations
with the regulator, it is on the cusp of a
return to consistent growth.
However, a weak share price, threats
from competition, gathering sectorconsolidation and stake-building by
Patrick Drahi, an industry tycoon and
BT’s largest shareholder, has left “one of
the most recognised brands in the
country” potentially vulnerable to an
overseas and private equity takeover.
The BT event, at One Braham in
Aldgate, was held ten days before the
expiration of a six-month period pre-
venting Drahi, 58, from launching a bid.
The prospect of a takeover attempt for
BT from the founder of Altice, the
French telecoms group, and owner of
Sotheby’s — or from elsewhere —
presents another potential dilemma for
ministers, caught between encouraging
inward investment while protecting
vital British assets.
The situation at BT is being moni-
tored in Westminster and is understood
to have been raised by Whitehall offi-
cials during their regular meetings with
the company.
Any takeover attempt could present
an early test of the new National
Security and Investment Act, which
comes into force in January. Lord
Callanan, the business minister, has
sought to reassure the City that only a
very small number of deals will face
intervention under the regime.
Speculation heightened this week
before the Drahi date and after a report
in India that Mukesh Ambani, the
billionaire telecoms tycoon and the
country’s richest man, was weighing up
a bid. It has unsettled union bosses.
Prospect, the union, wrote to Kwasi
Kwarteng, the business secretary, on
Thursday urging him “to take personal
charge of assessing any takeover”.
Mike Clancy, Prospect’s general
secretary, called BT “one of the jewels
in the crown of UK innovation and tech
R&D” and the union said it “raises fears
over whether UK jobs and research will
be safeguarded, particularly if any new
owner is motivated by a short-term
payout rather than long-term returns”.
Openreach’s full-fibre investment is
important to the government’s “level-
ling up” agenda and manifesto commit-
ment. BT’s services also include hand-
ling emergency service calls and cyber-
security for government, while Jansen
is a member of the government’s Build
Back Better Council of industry leaders.
In addition to Openreach, the group,
which was privatised in 1984, also owns
EE, the mobile network, and BT Sport.
A top ten institutional shareholder in
BT, speaking confidentially, said yester-presentation this week to impress on
stakeholders its position as a “national
champion”.
“Our network is the backbone of
the UK,” Jansen, chief executive of
Britain’s largest telecoms group, told
the audience. “We’ve made a once-in-
a-generation commitment to acceler-
ate digital opportunity — £15 billion to
build the UK’s first and only nationwide
full-fibre network by 2026.”
Jansen, 54, was launching BT’s
“manifesto”, with targets covering
diversity and sustainability, after three