India's third largest telco Idea Cellular Ltd. has received approval from the Department of Telecommunications to sell about 9,000 stand-alone mobile towers to American Tower Corp.'s India arm for 40 billion rupees, The Economic Times (India) reported May 24, quoting an unnamed DoT official.
This reportedly concludes a two-phase buyout of about 20,000 towers belonging to Vodafone India and Idea Cellular by Boston-based ATC for 78.50 billion rupees, boosting its tower portfolio in India to 80,000.
Vodafone India and Idea Cellular announced in November 2017 that they will sell their stand-alone towers to the local unit of ATC in cash. The two Indian telcos are headed for a merger and decided to trim debt ahead of the amalgamation.
Vodafone sold its 10,926 captive towers to ATC in April for 38.50 billion rupees.
ATC's Indian competitors Indus Towers Ltd. and Bharti Infratel Ltd. hold 123,000 and 91,000 towers, respectively.
As of May 24, US$1 is equivalent to 68.34 Indian rupees.
