Mumbai, June 14: Hutchison Max Telecom plans to consolidate all group companies under a single entity to create one of the largest mobile operators in the country. The company has already approached the Foreign Investment Promotion Board for approval.

The application is to allow shareholders of all subsidiaries to transfer their shares to HMTL and then become shareholders of the parent company,

HMTL’s subsidiaries in India include Hutchison Essar Telecom (Delhi), Fascel (Gujarat), Hutchison Telecom (East), Hutchison Essar South and Aircel Digilink India.

Hutchison Telecom East operates in Calcutta while Hutchison Essar South has licensed areas like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Chennai, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh (West) and Bengal. Aircel Digilink is an operator in Uttar Pradesh (East), Rajasthan and Haryana, a company statement said.

The company is also planning to tap the capital market with an initial public offering and the present move is seen as a precursor to its plans. FIPB’s approval will see the wireless licences of Hutch coming under the Mumbai entity — Hutchison Max Telecom Ltd.

The combined subscriber base of the entity at the end of May was 5.6 million and it covered 56 per cent of the country's population.

The group has the Ruias of Essar, Uday Kotak of the Kotak group, the Hindujas of Fascel and Analjit Singh of Max India as its Indian partners.

Hutchison Whampoa, the main promoter of the Indian telecom outfit, has plans to list its own shares in Hong Kong, New York and then spin off the Indian mobile assets.

The Hong Kong-based Hutchison Telecom Internationa holds around 42 per cent in the Indian company.