Cellnex Telecom has inked an an agreement with Bouygues Telecom to acquire and build additional 3,000 sites to its current French portfolio of 500 mobile towers. Cellnex is Europe’s leading independent operator of wireless telecommunications infrastructure, with a total portfolio of over 18,000 sites.
The first stage will see an acquisition of up to 1,800 urban sites located throughout France for a total value of 500 million Euros. This will complement the network of 500 towers acquired from Bouygues Telecom in 2016 that are now being incorporated into Cellnex France. A clear majority of these towers to be integrated over the next two years are located in areas of high population density, which make them especially suitable for future growth and the densification of networks (small cells) accompanying the future roll-out of 5G.
This will be followed by an additional of 1,200 new towers for a total value of 354 million Euros. These new towers will be incorporated and operated by Cellnex France as they come on stream in the period 2017-2022.
Once the incorporation of the 3,000 sites into Cellnex France is completed, they are expected to generate annual EBITDA of approximately 61 million Euros on a run rate basis excluding synergies, said Cellnex in a statement. As Bouygues Telecom will be the anchor tenant of these sites, both companies have signed a Master Service Agreement for an initial period of 15 years that can be extended up to 15 additional years.
Tobias Martinez, Cellnex Telecom
This is a decisive step for Cellnex Telecom in further extending its footprint in Europe and consolidating its role as the leading telco infrastructure operator, capable of partnering with our customer base of Mobile Network Operators whose operations and needs cover different European countries.
