Tata Communications may bid for London based telecom company - Cable & Wireless Plc in the next two weeks, according to ET. Vodafone Group is also considering a bid for the troubled telecom company.

Rothschild and Barclays Capital are advising Cable & Wireless to explore strategic options after being approached by the suitors, while Standard Chartered is advising Tatas on the acquisition, according to ToI.

C&W Worldwide, created in 2010 by a demerger, supplies telecoms services to businesses and public sector bodies. The other half of the demerger, Cable & Wireless Communications PLC, supplies broadband, mobile and other communications services to consumers and small- and medium-sized businesses in the Caribbean, Panama, Macau and Monaco.

It owns 4,25,000km of cables connecting more than 150 countries, with strong presence in former British colonies where it provided local telephone service. It provides services to major British companies such as Next, Tesco and United Utilities.

Once worth 2.4Bn pounds after separating from its parent company in March 2010, Cable & Wireless has since lost 1.7Bn pounds in market value. In November the company suspended future dividend payments as sales fell in its traditional voice network and announced that John Pluthero was stepping down as CEO after less than six months at the helm. The operator said Feb. 16 that profitability in its voice business has declined as contracts are renegotiated. The company had also announced writedowns of 624Mn pounds in November.

C&W Worldwide Stock Performance

Source: Guardian

Cable & Wireless is now valued at 1.8 times its Ebitda of 466Mn pounds in the most recently reported 12 months, data compiled by Bloomberg show. That makes it the cheapest of the world's 131 telecommunications carriers with market values higher than $1Bn and for which Ebitda multiples are available. The industry median is 5.5 times, the data show.

Tata Communications has been building it's telecom business through acquisitions. It acquired VSNL in 2002, Tyco International (US) in 2004 and Teleglobe (Canada) and Neotel (South Africa) in 2009. Last year, it acquired US-based BitGravity Inc., which provides network for content delivery over the internet.

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