New Delhi, May 8: Will Bharti Airtel’s bid for acquiring controlling stakes in South Africa’s MTN go uncontested, or rival operators would join the fray to jack up MTN’s valuation from the current estimated $37 billion?

While companies like the UK-based Vodafone, which has operations spread across several countries and homegrown Reliance Communications have so far not indicated any interest in getting into the race. China Mobile, the world’s largest mobile company by subscriber base on Thursday said that it is interested in the South Africa market but has not bid for MTN.

“China Mobile has not joined the MTN bidding, but we are interested in the South African market and we are looking at various opportunities for entering that market,” chief executive Wang Jianzhou was quoted by Reuters having told reporters following the firm’s annual general meeting on Thursday.

As per the report, Jianzhou declined to elaborate on the firm's intentions. Bharti and MTN Group had said on Monday that they were in talks, which may or may not lead to a deal. There’s been intense speculation among analysts and brokerage firms that China Mobile, Vodafone and Reliance Communications could enter the fray which would steeply increase MTN’s valuation.

According to a report in London’s Financial Times early this week, Bharti has put an indicative bid of $19 billion for acquiring 51% stake in the company. Going by this MTN has been valued at $37 billion.

Marvin Lo, an analyst with Daiwa Institute of Research in Hong Kong, told Reuters that if China Mobile were to bid for MTN, it would likely do so at the parent company level -- an approach often taken by Chinese state-controlled companies when making acquisitions. Those assets are then eventually injected into the listed units of state enterprises.

China Mobile dominates its domestic market with roughly 400 million subscribers, more than three times the combined customer base of Bharti and MTN, but has a mixed track record of acquisitions. It came close to buying emerging markets operator Millicom International Cellular in 2006 before pulling the plug on the deal. Last year, it bought Pakistan's Paktel Ltd from Millicom for $284 million. China Mobile was also rumoured last year to be eyeing MTN, but denied at the time that a deal was in the works.