Zain Saudi Arabia has transferred ownership of a subsidiary, Zain Business Ltd, to the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), paving the way for the sale of the cellco’s tower infrastructure which was approved in February this year. As reported by MENAFN, a statement to the Saudi stock exchange on Sunday disclosed that the PIF has changed the transferred division’s name to Golden Lattice Investment (GLI), which will be the holding company for Zain Saudi’s tower infrastructure units. Under the agreement, all these units will be transferred to GLI within 18 months of financial completion, by which time at least 3,000 sites should already be transferred over. As part of the asset purchase agreement, Zain Saudi will receive a cash amount of SAR2.4 billion (USD639 million) and a 20% stake in GLI.
As previously reported by TeleGeography’s CommsUpdate, in February Zain Saudi Arabia’s Board of Directors approved the binding offer submitted by a PIF-led consortium to acquire an 80% stake in the 8,069-tower passive infrastructure in a deal valued at SAR3.026 billion. The PIF is expected to take a 60% share, with Sultan Holding Company and Prince Saud bin Fahd bin Abdulaziz each obtaining 10% shares and Zain initially retaining 20%, although the PIF will have a call option on this portion.