Farallon May Question Linktone Deal

Hedge fund Farallon Capital Management LLC wants to have a second look at a deal involving the combination of a Chinese and Indonesian company. On Tuesday, the San Francisco-based fund and a group of investors made an activist regulatory filing at telecom and media phone company Linktone Ltd., a telecom and media services company that announced Nov. 29 that Jakarta-based media company PT Media Nusantara was buying more than 51% of its shares.
According to a Schedule 13D Securities and Exchange Commission filing, Farallon owns a 9.9% stake in Linktone and is considering discussions with shareholders, directors or other officers of the company. “[Farallon] may engage in communications with, without limitation, one or more shareholders of the company, one or more officers of the company, one or more members of the board of directors of the company or any other persons regarding the company, including but not limited to its operations and the company’s agreement with PT Media Nusantara Citra for PT Media Nusantara Citra to purchase not less than 51% of Linktone’s outstanding shares,” the filing reported.
According to a Linktone press release, PT Media Nusantara will buy its stake in Linktone using a combination of existing American Depository Shares, and a subscription for newly issued shares.
Linktone of Shanghai, China, has a $79 million stock market capitalization. It develops, markets and distributes consumer telecom applications services, including wireless entertainment services. Farallon was founded in 1986 and manages capital for high-net-worth individuals and institutions made up primarily of college endowments and foundations. It had about 120 employees. — Ron Orol
See SEC filingSee Nov. 29 press release from Linktone
Ron Orol is a Washington-based reporter for The Deal and author of Extreme Value Hedging: How Activist Hedge Fund Managers Are Taking on the World.