Vodafone India and Idea Cellular have separately agreed to sell their standalone tower businesses in India to American Tower Corp (ATC) for US$1.2 billion (INR78.5 billion).
This transaction follows the Vodafone India and Idea merger announcement in March. The deal, which is expected to be completed in the first half of 2018, will consolidate ATC’s position as the second-largest telecom tower company in India with about 80,000 towers.
After Vodafone India and Idea have completed their merger, around 6,300 co-located tenancies of the two operators on the combined standalone tower businesses will collapse into single tenancies over a period of two years without the payment of exit penalties.
At the same time, Vodafone India is exploring opportunities for sell its stake in India's largest mobile tower firm Indus Towers that has nearly 123,000 towers, to Bharti Airtel's mobile tower arm Bharti Infratel. Bharti Infratel and Vodafone each hold 42% stake each in Indus Tower, with the rest by Idea Cellular.