The new board of fraud-hit Satyam Computer Services is looking to appoint two to three investment banks to look at possible buyers of the firm, reports Economic Times. The names that are currently under consideration are Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Deutsche Bank. The new board on its Saturday meeting has also appointed executive search firm Egon Zehnder to help find a CEO.
Interestingly, Vivek Paul, former vice chairman of Wipro Ltd and an ex-partner at TPG, told ET that he would not be interested in becoming the CEO. Paul's name was doing the rounds as the CEO of the troubled company. Paul told ET that he would rather leave such an assignment to the generation next in the IT industry.
After the Maytas deal fell off, several suitors, including domestic and international IT service firms and major private equity funds, were thinking of buying out Satyam. Domestic IT firms like Tech Mahindra and HCL Technologies have also shown interest in the firm. Larsen & Tubro has also bought 4% stake in the firm, has reportedly approached top government officials saying it has an action plan to save the software-maker. L&T has said that if government agrees to takeover the liabilities of Satyam, it can guide Satyam.
Various options like separately selling Satyam BPO, the Pune-based subsidiary of Satyam Computer Services, are also being explored. But the main impediment remains the possible class action lawsuits being faced by Satyam in the US.
The six directors of Satyam - HDFC chairman Deepak Parekh, CII chief mentor Tarun Das, former Nasscom president Kiran Karnik, Securities Appellate Tribunal's former presiding officer C Achuthan, ICAI former president T Manoharan, and LIC's S Balakrishnan - also discussed a number of other issues. The directors have divided among themselves the major clients of Satyam, and would individually call them.
