The acquisition and integration of Warid by Mobilink is set to be accompanied by the spinning off of the combined operator’s towers. TowerXchange understands that one tower company has secured a period of exclusive negotiations to close the deal to acquire 13,000-13,700 towers (after the elimination of overlapping sites). A further 8,318 towers are coming to market as Ufone seeks to monetise their assets, which could increase the total level of decommissioning to around 10%. Besides parallel infrastructure, what other challenges will be faced by the towerco acquiring these assets?
The merger between Mobilink and Warid will put some competitive distance between VimpelCom’s Pakistani subsidiary and their nearest challenges Telenor.