FORTUNE — Japan’s Softbank Corp. today confirmed that it will buy a 70% stake in Sprint Nextel Corp. (S), America’s third-largest mobile carrier, for approximately $20.1 billion.
It’s the second larger merger announcement of 2012, following mining company Xstrata PLC’s proposed $33 billion tie-up with commodities group Glencore. And it is by far the year’s largest tech merger, leaving deals like Facebook’s (FB) sub-$1 billion purchase of Instagram in the dust.
Overall, Softbank-Sprint ranks as the 128th-largest global M&A deal of all time, according to Thomson Reuters.
In terms of telecom transactions, Softbank-Sprint ranks #27, and is the largest such deal since Mexico’s Carso Global Telecom bought America Movil for over $27 billion in 2010. Below is a list of the all-time top telecom M&A deals, courtesy of Thomson Reuters:
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