State-owned telco Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) is looking to create a separate entity for its 40,000 telecom towers, according to the Business Standard citing a senior BSNL official.
The local newspaper went on to explain that a stake in the new business…
State-owned telco Bharat Sanchar Nigam (BSNL) is looking to create a separate entity for its 40,000 telecom towers, according to the Business Standard citing a senior BSNL official.
The local newspaper went on to explain that a stake in the new business would then be sold to private equity investors in order to create an additional source of revenue for the struggling company.
The towers could be valued at between Rs160bn (US$3.5bn) and Rs200bn (US$4.4bn), wrote the newspaper.
The company was unavailable for comment before the press deadline.
This report comes just a few days after BSNL was reportedly in discussions with several operators, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Idea and RCom, about potential tower-sharing agreements.
The company, which already has agreements in place with Tata Teleservices and Aircel, is looking to limit potential losses in the face of growing competition.
BSNL has reportedly received some suggestions from Viom Networks about its options for the tower business.
In recent months, several telecom tower companies, including Idea, RCom and GTL, have been considering options such as IPOs and asset sales to raise much needed cash to cut or repay existing debt.
Infratel, Vodafone Essar, and Idea Cellular opted for the tower spin-offs that created Indus Towers, the current domestic leader with about 100,000 towers.
