Uniti Group Ltd hiked its takeover offer for OptiComm Ltd on Thursday to A$694.2 million ($495.38 million), nearly 3% higher than pension fund Aware Super's bid, ratcheting up the battle for the fibre infrastructure provider.
The telecom services firm announced a cash plus stock offer of A$6.67 per share for OptiComm, its third offer, coming three days after Aware Super made an improved A$6.5 offer.
OptiComm said it will back Uniti's "superior" offer.
Under the revised bid, Uniti will pay A$5.2 per share in cash and 1.07 of its shares for each OptiComm share.
An Aware Super spokeswoman said the company was assessing the situation but had no further comment for now.
Uniti said it will fund the improved offer by increasing its committed debt facilities by A$40 million and issuing an extra 26 million shares.
It still expects A$10 million in cost savings and double-digit boost to its earnings per share in fiscal 2020.
($1 = 1.4013 Australian dollars)
(Reporting by Nikhil Kurian Nainan in Bengaluru; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)
