Telecom Italia (TI) expects to receive non-binding offers for TIM Brasil’s tower assets by the end of the month.
The struggling Italian incumbent, which has a controlling stake in TIM, said in its Q1 results presentation there had been a high level of…
Telecom Italia (TI) expects to receive non-binding offers for TIM Brasil’s tower assets by the end of the month.
The struggling Italian incumbent, which has a controlling stake in TIM, said in its Q1 results presentation there had been a high level of interest in the sites from both financial and strategic investors.
TIM’s board gave management the green light to dispose of the towers in April in a bid to create value and improve efficiencies.
TIM has a portfolio of around 7,000 towers across Brazil and last November it emerged that TI mandated Morgan Stanley to sound out interest in the infrastructure.
Selling towers in Brazil would follow in the footsteps of rivals Oi, Vivo and NII Holdings, which have all sold sites to towercos.
US companies American Tower and SBA Communications are the two largest independent towercos in Brazil and both remain acquisitive. Smaller rival BR Towers has also been looking to snap up sites.
Recent tower deals in the country have seen prices per site range from US$100,000 to US$320,000, based upon the last four significant publicly-disclosed transactions.
TI has said it has no intention of selling TIM Brasil itself. However, Telefonica’s investment in TI – where it controls TI’s controlling shareholder Telco – has posed a problem in Brazil.
Telefonica and TI separately own the nation’s two largest mobile operators: Vivo and TIM. The Brazilian antitrust regulator has told Telefonica that it must either reduce its stake in Telco or find a new partner to take control of Vivo, although there is not a deadline for Telefonica to abide by the ruling.
It has been speculated that TIM may be broken up and its assets distributed among rival operators. The situation does not look like it will be resolved ahead of Brazil’s planned spectrum auction, set to take place in August.
