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Tata Teleservices Ltd (TTSL) has sought the approval of the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) to sell the remaining stake in its tower business to American Tower Corporation (ATC), for nearly ₹2,500 crore.
Following the closure of the transaction, ATC’s stake in ATC TIPL — the second-largest private telecom tower firm in India with a portfolio of about 80,000 mobile towers — will be close to 90 per cent. The remaining stake in the company will be held by funds owned by Macquarie.
“This is an extension of the earlier signed deal, when TTSL sold nearly half of its stake to ATC in October 2018. TTSL has an option to sell the remaining stake, which must be exercised in this financial year,” a source close to the development said.Separately, sources in DoT also confirmed the development. While ATC declined to comment, TTSL could not be immediately contacted for comments.
Last year, TTSL had offered to sell 50 per cent of its total stake while another stakeholder, IDFC, sold its entire stake in ATC’s tower unit for ₹2,940 crore. The companies, redeeming their put options, offloaded the stakes to ATC.
Separately, TTSL, which merged its consumer mobile businesses with Bharti Airtel in a cashless deal in 2017, paid ₹2,368 crore to ATC as one-time settlement for closing down nearly 30,000 telecom towers.
In October 2015, ATC bought a 51 per cent stake in Viom Networks from TTSL and SREI Infrastructure Finance for ₹7,635 crore, and later renamed the company ATC TIPL.
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