Iliad finalises sale of 30% stake in OnTower Poland to Cellnex

French and international service provider Iliad has announced the sale of its residual 30% stake in OnTower Poland (“OTP”), the company that manages the group’s passive mobile telecommunications infrastructure in Poland, to telco operator Cellnex Group for PLN 2.3 billion, or approximately €510 million.

The company revealed the sale was finalised Friday June 30, with Cellnex owning full control 100% of this group’s subsidiary in Poland.

The sale follows the completion of the transaction consisting in the sale of 60% of OTP to the Cellnex Group on April 1, 2021, and a further sale (of 10% of OTP) on February 28, 2022.

The 30% residual stake sold by the group  was recorded in the balance sheet within “Assets held for sale”.

OnTower Poland currently operates a total of 8,500 sites in Poland and plans to deploy up to c. 3,400 new sites up to 2030, and has a 20-year service provision contract with Play, extendable for additional successive 10-year periods.

Cellnex manages a portfolio of around 135,000 sites —including forecast roll-outs up to 2030– in Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, France, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal, Austria, Denmark, Sweden and Poland. The business is structured in four major areas –  telecommunications infrastructure services; audiovisual broadcasting networks, security and emergency service networks and solutions for smart urban infrastructure and services management .

In official statement, Cellnex said: “This transaction must be seen as an intermediate step in the process of actively assessing strategic options for our current portfolio in order to crystallize value and accelerate the path to the Investment Grade rating (commitment to secure the BBB- rating by S&P by 2024 the latest, and maintain the BBB rating by Fitch).”