In parallel with the takeover bid for Polish operator Play in the fall of 2020, Iliad intended to apply in Poland the strategy already adopted in France with Cellnex.

The agreement with the European mobile infrastructure operator, which covers 7,000 sites, was aimed at transferring 60% of the company's structure to Cellnex, and was designed to manage the passive telecoms infrastructure of the French operator's new Polish subsidiary.

It also included a collaboration with Cellnex to build at least 1,500 additional sites over 10 years for €400 million.

On April 1st, Iliad announced that it had finally finalized the extension of its industrial partnership with Cellnex through the sale to the latter of 60% of the company managing passive mobile telecommunications infrastructures in Poland, for the sum of €804 million before tax. This will enable its Polish partner to strengthen its investment capacities and enter a new development cycle with the deployment and acquisition of 5G frequencies, the densification of its mobile network, but above all the desire to enter the fixed-line market on a European scale.

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Source : freenews

Spanish company Cellnex has just acquired the entire portfolio of 10,500 French mobile sites from Hivory, SFR's TowerCo. Effective by the second half of 2021 and subject to approval by the authorities, the transaction was valued at 5.2 billion euros for Cellnex. It will also include an additional investment program of 900 million euros to deploy 2,500 new sites by 2029.

With this transaction, Cellnex is at the forefront of the mobile infrastructure market in France. Present in France since 2016 through its local branch, the group had more than 9,000 mobile sites throughout the country by 2020. The acquisition of Hivory puts Cellnex in the shoes of the sector leader, with nearly 20,000 mobile sites (antennas and rooftop terraces) across the country.

As under the agreements entered into by Bouygues Telecom and then Free with Cellnex, SFR is expected to remain the tenant of its former mobile infrastructure network for a period of at least 18 years, renewable for periods of 5 years.

The agreement signed with SFR illustrates the Group's strong ambitions in France and Europe. The Spanish mobile infrastructure champion has therefore just acquired one of its main competitors on the French market.

Now only TDF and the future TowerCo of Orange France remain on the French market to face the Spanish giant. This puts the latter in a comfortable position, before its new capital increase. This should enable it to finance a portfolio of acquisition projects, part of which has already been committed for the acquisition of Hivory in France and the integration of Deutsche Telekom's sites in the Netherlands.

For fiscal year 2019, the Group recorded a 15% increase in total revenues for the year and a 16% increase in EBITDA compared to the previous fiscal year. With operations in Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal, Austria, Denmark and Sweden, the Spanish ogre now has a fleet of 120,000 sites, 75,000 of which are operational, with the remainder being acquired or deployed by 2028.

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Source : ZDNet

The partnership between the European pylon giant Telco and Bouygues Telecom is being further strengthened with the creation of a joint venture (51% owned by Cellnex and 49% by Bouygues Telecom). This new agreement concerns the deployment and operation of the operator's fibre optic network in France, with an investment of one billion euros by 2027.

This will enable Cellnex to deploy a 31 500 km network linking the roofs and telecom masts operated by Bouygues Telecom to the network of "metropolitan offices" designed to house data processing centres.

This will create "a real fibre optic ring linking several key elements of the fixed and mobile ecosystem, from fibre-connected masts to data centres and small cells", said Tobias Martinez, CEO of Cellnex.

Placed within the framework of a joint venture created between the two companies, the agreement will also cover the deployment of 90 new "metropolitan offices" by 2027.

In France since 2016 via its local branch, the group now has 130 employees responsible for managing a portfolio of 9,192 mobile sites throughout the country. This rapid growth has led Cellnex France to become a first-name customer for the other two sector champions, Hivory and TDF.

This is a good illustration of the group's strong ambitions in France and in Europe, where in 2019 - and for the first time ever - it will generate 51% of its turnover and 60% of its ebitda outside Spain.

This strategy is supported by a substantial investment by the Spanish ogre in France. 4.3 billion in France since the creation of its local branch. 4.3 billion in France since the creation of its local branch, making it Spain's leading investor and raising it to the status of a benchmark player in mobile infrastructures.

Cellnex France has also acquired 5,700 passive sites from Free through the acquisition of 70% of Iliad's TowerCo.

This strategy has paid off, since 67.5% of Cellnex's revenues are now derived from infrastructure services to mobile operators. The Spanish giant has announced that it has exceeded the one billion euro revenue mark in 2019, with 36,471 sites now operational in Europe.

The group recorded overall revenues up 15% for the year and Ebitda up 16% compared to the previous year. And with an order book that now stands at 44 billion euros, this is not likely to stop.

This performance owes a lot to an extraordinary investment by the Spanish ogre. It has injected no less than 8 billion euros into growth operations in 2019.

"2019 will undoubtedly have been a year of transformation with a prodigious leap in size and a qualitative leap in strengthening the group's position in its key markets, as well as an expansion of our geographical presence in Europe," said Franco Bernabè, the group's chairman.

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Source : ZDNet

After Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Ireland, the European telecommunications infrastructure giant Cellnex is setting out to conquer Portugal. On January 2, the company announced the acquisition of 100% of Portuguese tower operator OMTEL, valued at EUR 800 million, 25% of which was owned by Altice Europe, SFR's parent company.

The Portuguese company heads 25% of the tower network in Portugal and its main customer is PT Portugal, the operator owned by Altice Europe.

"With OMTEL, we are not only integrating one of the leading independent operators of telecommunications infrastructure in Portugal. We are also committed to consistent growth in Europe, integrating an eighth market - which naturally extends the current geographical coverage of the seven countries in which we are already present", says Tobias Martínez, CEO of Cellnex.

The management of the Spanish company has also indicated that it wants to strengthen OMTEL's network with an additional 350 sites by 2027, for an investment of 140 million euros.

An investment outburst that does not seem to frighten Cellnex. Since its IPO in 2015, the company has announced that it has committed no less than 12 billion euros of investment for the acquisition or construction until 2027 of around 48,000 telecommunications infrastructures in addition to the 10,000 or so that the company had at its disposal at the time. Its portfolio thus amounts to a total of 58,000 sites.

Cellnex's appetite also extends to France. After acquiring no less than 3,000 sites belonging to Bouygues Telecom in 2017 for a total of 800 million euros, the Spanish ogre finalised at the end of last year the acquisition of 70% of Iliad TowerCo, which operates some 5,700 mobile telecommunications sites in France, for a deal valued at 2 billion euros.

2 billion. The transaction with Free, which also included the sale of 100% of Free's Italian infrastructure subsidiary and 90% of Salt's antennas, enabled Cellnex to increase its number of masts from 3,000 mobile telecommunications sites to more than 8,000 sites in France.

This is enough to make the competition shudder, given that Hivory claims a fleet of more than 10,000 sites and TDF's fleet peaks at 13,900 sites.

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Source : ZDNet

Free's parent company has just sold its passive mobile telecommunications infrastructure in France and Italy to Cellnex. This Spanish operator is acquiring all the Italian pylons and more than 70% of the French infrastructure for $2 billion.  That is nearly 10,000 sites in both countries.

Iliad and Cellnex will be partners in the management and development of Iliad Tower Co for the French business. This service contract includes a construction program for 4,500 custom-built sites.

Iliad's Chief Executive Officer, Thomas Reynaud, explains that "this operation is part of an industrial logic that accelerates the deployment of 4G and 5G networks and increases Iliad's investment capacity. It will enable the efficient deployment of tomorrow's infrastructures for the benefit of all operators and also aims to better meet the challenges of territorial coverage".

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Source : Le Monde Informatique