US regulators finally approved the US$21.6 billion bid from SoftBank Corp to take control of Sprint Nextel Corp. The latter is the No.3 US wireless provider and was given approval to be acquired last Friday.
The three members of the Federal Communications Commission voted in favor of the merger. They were also in favor of Sprint's related plan to buy a part of the Clearwire Corp that it does not already own. The FCC approval was the last piece that SoftBank needed after getting nods from US antitrust and national security regulators. Japan's SoftBank planned to enter the US market through the acquisition of wireless provider. Mignon Clybum, acting FCC chairperson approved the deal.
The acquisition of SoftBank for Sprint Nextel Corp marked the largest ever overseas purchase by a Japanese company. Billionaire founder Masayoshi Son of SoftBank looked to expand beyond the Japanese cellular phone market and saw the acquisition a good move for the strategy.
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