America Movil SAB (AMXL), Latin America’s biggest wireless provider, has hired Bank of America Corp. to sell phone assets as part of a split up plan to soothe Mexican lawmakers, according to people familiar With the issue.

Prospective purchasers consist of AT&T Inc. (T) and also SoftBank Corp. (9984), among people said, who asked not to be named considering that promotion discussions are private.

America Movil, controlled by billionaire Carlos Slim, is seeking for to offer parts of its Mexican procedures to reduce the company's market share here HALF and avoid brand-new rules developed to rein in its supremacy. The company has 70 percent of Mexico's mobile clients and regarding 80% of its landlines.

The company revealed plans for the property promotion, together with an spinoff of its Mexican wireless towers, in July. To gain regulatory support for the plan, the buyer will certainly need to be a new candidate to the Mexican market to produce more competitors, the firm has said. That eliminates Telefonica SA (TEF), America Movil's biggest competitor as well as Mexico's second-largest phone service provider.

America Movil hasn't disclosed which properties it will offer, making it tough to determine the amount of they'll be worth. Citigroup Inc. has actually approximated the business could increase $4 billion or even more.

Press officials for America Movil as well as SoftBank didn't immediately reply to demands for remark yesterday. John Yiannacopoulos, a Bank of America representative, decreased to comment, as did Brad Burns, an AT&T spokesman.

AT&T sold its stake in America Movil previously this year as component of its plan to acquire satellite-TV service provider DirecTV, which takes on Slim's company for video customers in Brazil and also Colombia. The $48.5 billion investment is anticipated to shut next year.

Sky Mexico

DirecTV holds a minority stake in Sky Mexico, the nation's largest TELEVISION provider . Acquiring phone networks in the nation can permit AT&T combine the video clip solution with cordless solutions or with landline Internet gain access to.

SoftBank, based in Tokyo, has operations in the Western Hemisphere via Sprint Corp., the most significant U.S. wireless provider after Verizon Communications Inc. and also AT&T. Sprint named Marcelo Claure, a Spanish-speaking Bolivian resident and also longtime Miami resident who established phone representative Brightstar Corp., as its chief executive officer last month.

While SoftBank scrapped plans to purchase T-Mobile United States Inc., the company sold almost $4 billion in bonds recently, a battle chest it might use for acquisitions.