IHS to take control of MTN’s Nigeria towers

Cape Town – MTN [JSE:MTN] has reached an agreement in principle with specialist tower company IHS Holding to operate MTN’s 9 151 mobile network towers in Nigeria.

The transaction is expected to reduce MTN Nigeria’s operating costs, drive network efficiencies and further expand MTN’s voice and data capacity, the South African mobile giant said in a statement on Thursday.
In terms of the deal, which is subject to regulatory approvals, the towers will be transferred to a new company which will be owned jointly by MTN and IHS, but IHS will have full operational control of the underlying business.

The new towers company will market independent infrastructure sharing services to other mobile operators and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Nigeria. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2014.

MTN CEO Sifiso Dabengwa said the deal will allow MTN to concentrate on further raising its own service levels, improving the customer experience and ensuring the mobile service provider remain the number one operator in Nigeria.  Could this be good news?