Britain's Virgin Media O2 nears stake sale in towers business to GLIL – sources

Liberty Global

28/10/2023 11:19

By Amy-Jo Crowley, Andres Gonzalez and Paul Sandle
       LONDON, Oct 28 (Reuters) - Virgin Media O2 is in
exclusive talks to sell a slice of its shareholding in Britain's
largest mobile tower network to GLIL Infrastructure, according
to four sources familiar with the matter, in a deal that could
value the business at about 2.5 billion pounds ($3.03 billion).
    GLIL, a partnership of British pension funds, has prevailed
over other investment firms in an auction that Virgin Media O2's
owners, Liberty Global  LBTYA.O  and Telefonica  TEF.MC , held
for part of their 50% stake in the tower company, called
Cornerstone, earlier this year, the sources said on Friday.
    If negotiations are concluded successfully, a deal for a
minority stake of less than 25% could be announced as early as
next week, two of the sources added. 
    The sources cautioned that there remained a chance that no
deal would be completed and asked not to be identified because
the matter is confidential.
    Telefonica and Liberty Global have been working with
advisers on the sale of up to half of their combined 50% stake
in Cornerstone.
    Vodafone  VOD.L  owns the rest of the business through its
Frankfurt-based subsidiary Vantage Towers  VTWRn.H .
    Spokespeople for Telefonica, Liberty Global, Virgin Media O2
and GLIL declined to comment. 
    Cornerstone, established in 2012, is Britain's largest tower
company, managing more than 20,000 sites, according to the
company's website.
    In recent years infrastructure and private equity investors
have competed for slices in some of the largest tower deals,
including Deutsche Telekom's sale of a majority stake in GD
Towers, because of their stable cash yield and long-term
contracts.
 ($1 = 0.8241 pounds)

 (Reporting by Amy-Jo Crowley and Andres Gonzalez, with
additional reporting by Paul Sandle
Editing by Helen Popper)
 ((Amy-Jo.Crowley@thomsonreuters.com;))