Amended Agreement for T-Mobile and Sprint Merger

In a renegotiated agreement for T-Mobile US and Sprint’s proposed merger, Deutsche Telekom came out as a winner. According to the amended agreement, the German company will take a larger stake in the combined company.

DT was seeking an amendment to the original deal to reflect recent weakness in Sprint’s performance, with pressure mounting after a US court threw out a bid by US attorney generals to block the merger deal. T-Mobile US CEO John Legere said in a statement that the revision is another significant step forward toward finally closing this transaction, adding that the companies are now on the threshold of achieving their goal.

In a new arrangement, Sprint parent SoftBank Group agreed to surrender 48.8 million T-Mobile shares to be acquired in the merger to New T-Mobile immediately after the deal closes. That way, they have effectively agreed to a new exchange ratio of approximately 11 Sprint shares for each share of T-Mobile stock compared with 9.75 in an original agreement.

After the deal closes, SoftBank will hold a 24 percent stake in the combined company, down from 27 percent in the previous agreement. Deutsche Telekom will come away with a 43 percent stake, up from 42, while the remaining 33 percent will be held by public shareholders. However, SoftBank will have an opportunity to regain some ground if the combined company’s stock hits certain price targets.