Dubai: IHS Holding, Africa’s largest phone-tower company, said on Monday it plans to raise capital by $2.6 billion (Dh9.54 billion) in equity and debt, making it the largest equity raise since 2007.
The company plans to raise $2 billion in equity and $600 million in debt to fund acquisitions, which have more than doubled the size of IHS’ tower portfolio in the last 12 months and also furthered new site build programmes.
IHS has now raised a total of $4.5 billion since 2012 and deployed the funds in establishing market-leading positions across Africa in Nigeria, Cameroon, the Ivory Coast, Zambia and Rwanda.
“We are clear in our ambition to play a leading role in the creation of the widest, most efficient and reliable mobile networks in Africa,” Essam Darwish, Chief Executive Officer, said in the statement.
This latest equity investment of $2 billion has been secured from existing and new shareholders, further signalling the continued confidence of the capital markets in our business model and management team. The debt component of $600 million is split between USD and Naira and includes a 7-year tranche and 8-year tranche.
Analysts feel more companies may follow similar issuances.
“The market conditions have improved as African markets have outpeformed other capital markets, so we see more companies taking this route of raising capital through equity,” Jaap Meijer, managing director, equity research, Arqaam Capital told Gulf News.
