DoT clears Rs 4,000 crore Idea-ATC mobile tower sale deal

KOLKATA | NEW DELHI: The telecom department (DoT) on Thursday cleared Idea Cellular’s sale of nearly 9,000 standalone towers to a local arm of American Tower Corp (ATC) for Rs 4,000 crore.
A top DoT official told ET the “Idea-ATC captive towers deal has been approved”. This marks the conclusion of the US tower company’s two-stage buyout of Vodafone India and Idea’s near 20,000-odd combined standalone towers for Rs 7,850 crore. Last month, the government had cleared Vodafone India’s sale of its 10,926 captive towers to ATC for Rs 3,850 crore.

As of press time, ATC and Idea had not replied to ET’s queries.

The government is learnt to have also assured that the Kumar Birla-led Idea Cellular would be granted approval on its crucial application for increasing FDI shortly, for its upcoming merger with Vodafone India.

India’s third-largest telco, Idea, and the second-ranked Vodafone India, which are combining to form the country’s biggest phone company by revenue and subscribers, are expected to close their merger next month.

Idea Cellular is learnt to have also put in an application for final DoT approval for its merger with Vodafone India, a person with direct knowledge said.

Back in March, Telecom Secretary Aruna Sundararajan had said DoT is in the final stages of approving the merger between Idea and Vodafone India as clearances from Sebi and National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) have already come. While the Reserve Bank of India and the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP) have not raised any objections to the FDI increase by Idea, the DIPP has put the ball in DoT's court and asked the department to get clarification and documentation on whether all upstream and downstream companies that hold shares in the Indian entities of both companies are FDI compliant.

The final merger, however, will be subject to clearing of dues, especially the one-time spectrum charges (OTSC) of nearly Rs 6,000 crore.

Meanwhile, acquisition of Vodafone and Idea’s captive towers will boost ATC’s towers portfolio in India to nearly 80,000, taking it closer to market leader Indus Towers and Bharti Infratel who own over 1,23,000 and 91,000 towers, respectively.

The Boston-based independent tower operator has been steadily bolstering its India towers portfolio, having bought a 51% stake in erstwhile Viom Networks for Rs 7,635 crore in the largest inbound acquisition in FY16.

Last November, Vodafone India and Idea had announced plans to sell their respective standalone towers to a local ATC arm for Rs 7,850 crore ($1.2 billion) in cash, in a move aimed at paring debt in the run of their mega merger.

Vodafone India and Idea have also said that on conclusion of their merger, some 6,300 tenancies of both carriers co-located on the towers being sold to ATC would get converted into single tenancies over two years without the payment of exit penalties.