For a while now, I've been wondering if Indian Telecom is or isn't "too big to fail". The phrase "too big to fail" term that was used during the banks bail out - because of the cascading impact of money in the banking system, and the way financial institutions are connected, a bail out was necessary in order to prevent the collapse of the entire economy. Now while the same isn't applicable in case of Telecom in India, the fact remains that the telecom industry has for long been the poster child of Indian business, and responsible for attracting international investment into the country. Take a look at some of global, government-linked related investors in the Indian telecom sector: - Batelco in S Tel. The Government of Bahrain is a shareholder in Batelco - Etisalat in Swan Telecom (Etisalat DB). The UAE government is a key shareholder in Etisalat - NTT Docomo in Tata Teleservices. The Japanese government is a key shareholder in NTT. - Singtel in Airtel. Temasek, the investment arm of the Singapore government owns a significant stake in Singtel. - Sistema in Sistema Shyam Teleservices. The Russian government has picked up a significant stake in SSTL - Telenor in Unitech Wireless (Uninor). The Norwegian government is a shareholder in Telenor Apart from this, Vodafone has placed a big bet on its acquisition of what is now Vodafone-Essar. Loop, Videocon, Idea Cellular and RCOM haven't sold equity to foreign investors, but there's big money riding on each telecom…
