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Farewell
to the radio tower: Deutsche Telekom wants to get rid of its transmission masts, including the Berlin TV tower
Photo: Christophe Gateau / picture alliance / dpa
According to insiders, Deutsche Telekom has launched the multi-billion dollar sales process for its more than 40,000 transmission masts and radio towers.
Bids would be accepted within the next two weeks, three people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday.
Goldman Sachs is advising the Bonn-based Dax group on the sale of the radio tower business, the value of which is estimated at up to 18 billion euros.
Among those interested is Europe's industry leader Cellnex, said two people familiar with the matter.
However, financial investors would also have kept an eye on the business that Telekom boss
Tim Höttges
(59)
recently repeatedly referred to as the crown jewels and kingmaker.
In the past, American Tower and Vodafone subsidiary Vantage Towers have also been traded as potential buyers.
A spokesman for Deutsche Telekom said that various options for the cell tower business are currently being examined.
Cellnex, American Tower and Goldman Sachs declined to comment.
Höttges only said in February: "We are in the phase where we are considering exactly who is the right partner and who will give us the most attractive offer."
The Bonn-based radio tower business currently includes 40,100 locations and generated sales of 1.1 billion euros last year.
The subsidiary Deutsche Funkturm operates 33,600 radio masts in Germany, making it the largest provider of mobile and radio masts in Germany.
It also owns some well-known TV towers, such as the Berlin TV tower on Alexanderplatz.
There are also around 7,000 masts from the subsidiary Magenta Telekom Infra in Austria, where Telekom says it is the second largest provider.
In view of the debt mountain of more than 130 billion euros and the necessary expenditure for the expansion of the 5G infrastructure and to secure the majority of capital in the US subsidiary T-Mobile US, Deutsche Telekom needs fresh money.
Last year, Europe's largest telecom group had already sold its business in the Netherlands for almost four billion euros to a consortium with the financial investors Apax and Warburg Pincus - the employer of the former Telekom boss
Rene Obermann
(59).
There is a lot of movement in the radio tower industry - also because the 5G network construction and increasing digitization in the Corona crisis are causing high demand.
Infrastructure providers can rent the masts on the ground and on house roofs to several users at the same time more easily than mobile phone companies, which promises recurring income and plannable investments for years to come.
That's why Vodafone has taken its subsidiary Vantage public, Cellnex has been expanding for years and American Tower has acquired masts from Telefonica for 7.7 billion euros.
sio/reuters
