MTN South Africa has entered into formal discussions with American Tower Corporation over the sale of its tower assets in its domestic market, which could lead to a private sale, effectively bypassing the rumoured auction process. According to TMT Finance, Citigroup is thought to be advising MTN on the sale.
TeleGeography notes that American Tower Corporation is no stranger to the South African wireless sector, after paying Cell C USD430 million to acquire 1,400 existing towers and as many as 1,800 additional towers that were already under construction, or mooted for future development, in November 2010. While it is unclear how many towers MTN is planning to sell, in August 2012 it was reported that the company was looking to sell up to half of its mobile infrastructure; at that time MTN’s network reportedly consisted of around 6,000 towers, while it shared space on a further 2,000.