NEW YORK, May 16 (Reuters) – Dish Network Corp
asked U.S. regulators on Thursday to stop reviewing SoftBank
Corp’s proposed acquisition of Sprint Nextel Corp’s
, citing the Japanese company’s reported attempt to thwart
its bid for the U.S. wireless carrier.
The request follows a Reuters report on May 10 that SoftBank
asked several Wall Street investment banks not to finance Dish’s
$25.5 billion offer for Sprint by saying such a move could hurt
their chances of getting a piece of the public offering of
Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.
SoftBank owns 33 percent of Alibaba.
“If SoftBank has the power to influence crucial financing
decisions of a Chinese company and enlist those decisions in the
service of its effort to acquire Sprint, then the proposed
foreign ownership needs to be assessed in light of this Chinese
company as well,” DISH said in the letter to the Federal
Communications Commission.
“SoftBank is trying to force its offer on Sprint’s
shareholders by underhandedly seeking to undermine a superior
bid,” Dish wrote.
The Japanese telecom company, which has an existing
agreement with Sprint to buy 70 percent of the U.S. wireless
carrier for $20.1 billion, has criticized Dish’s offer, saying
it does not have committed financing in place.
Dish has lined up four banks, Barclay’s Plc,
Macquarie Group, Jefferies and the Royal Bank of Canada
, to help finance its proposed offer, people familiar
with the matter told Reuters on Wednesday.
An FCC spokesman declined to comment and Sprint could not be
reached for comment.
A SoftBank spokesman said, “This is yet another irrelevant
and unfounded filing based on unsubstantiated media reports.”
