C&WW shareholders undermined Tata bid Unrealistic expectations from large Cable & Wireless Worldwide shareholders undermined Tata Communications" bid to acquire the ailing British telecoms business, the head of the Indian group has said. But Vinod Kumar, group chief executive of Tata Communications, confirmed that the internet data services division of the Mumbai-based Tata conglomerate remained on the lookout for similar acquisitions in other developed world markets. Tata pulled out of a bidding race for the UK-based group in April, leaving Vodafone to agree a £1bn cash purchase. But C&WW shareholders, including Orbis Holdings, which owns 19.1 per cent, remain opposed to the bid. Speaking to the Financial Times Mr Kumar said: "When we felt there wasn't going to be a meeting of minds on value, especially with what some of their shareholders seemed to expect, we didn't want to waste anybody's time." "We went into it with a very clear understanding that we would not get swept away in the heat of any negotiations, and go and fiddle around with our spreadsheets," he added. We felt that the gap was too wide and it wasn't worth spending the time trying to bridge it. However Mr Kumar confirmed that the emerging markets-focused Indian group would look for similar acquisitions in future, as it seeks to establish a foothold in the UK, US, France, Germany or Canada. "We are keeping our eyes open to see if any other developed market customer bases cross our path," he said, stressing that the C&WW acquisition was primarily designed to expand the group's business with western blue-chip multinationals. Mr Kumar also ruled out speculation that Tata would be interested in picking up parts of C&WW's business, were Vodafone successfully to acquire the company and subsequently break it up; saying "pieces of Cable and Wireless are not of interest to us." The remarks came as Tata Communications unveiled results in which the group posted a consolidated post-tax loss of Rs2.6bn ($47m) in the three months to March, widening nearly 70 per cent from the same period last year, on revenues of Rs40bn ($716m). But Mr Kumar pointed to stronger growth in underlying measures of profitability following investments of close to $4bn over the last 8 years, and said the group was on a path to challenge the likes of AT&T, Verizon and BT in "offering communication services to businesses which have global needs." He also said the group would continue on strategy to grow globally by providing more valuable data services to larger enterprises, especially those seeking to expand into emerging markets. "We believe we can bring a very personalised Asian level of service to the global market," he said. We want to be the Singapore Airlines of telecoms, and if you've ever flown Singapore Airlines, I think you'll know what I mean by that. He also said the group, which operates a variety of data and telecoms services, including a submarine cables business, was seeking a third base in a large emerging market to compliments its existing bases in India and South Africa. Indonesia was a leading possibility.