India's Tower Companies Could Invest Rs 2 Trillion by 2025 for 5G Roll Out, Timeline of Tower Companies of India

There was a old post from 2017 - regarding the tower companies of India. However after Jio's entry with 4G in 2016 the scenario of Indian Telecom had changed a lot. As the mobile service providers saw ruthless merger and acquisition, the same came for tower space too. 

At present there are only handful of tower companies in India - top three companies are Summit Digitel, Indus Towers, American Tower Co. , just like the three pvt. telecom service providers - Jio, Airtel and Vi. Though in this space there are few smaller players survived - GTL, Aster.

As 5G is coming, the tower companies have found new zeal - by 2025 their investment could reach Rs 2 trillion to take care of 5G roll out. 

Timeline of Indian Tower Companies: 

• Reliance India Mobile was the first operator in the country who understood the importance of creating a separate infrastructure company – in 2001 Reliance Telecom Infrastructure Limited was founded to take care the towers, OFC and related assets of the company.
• Aster Infrastructure was founded in 2002.
• Global Group entered into tower biz with GTL Infra in 2004.
• In 2005 Independent Mobile Infrastructure (IMIL) was founded. (later shut down in 2009-10)
• In 2005 Kolkata based Kanoria Group backed SREI Infra ventured into tower biz via Quippo Telecom Infrastructure.
• In 2006 Tower Vision and Xcel Telecom entered into tower business.
• Delhi headquartered American Tower Corporation India started operations in India in 2007 starting from Bihar and Orissa.
• In 2007 Transcend Infrastructure was founded in Kolkata. 

• In July 2007 Bharti Airtel demerge their tower business as Bharti Infratel.
• In November 2007 Bharti Infratel (42%), Vodafone India (42%) and Idea Cellular (16%) founded Indus Towers – the largest tower company in the world with more than 1.2 lakh towers.

• In 2008 Quippo bought of Spice Telecom’s towers.
• Reliance Telecom Infrastructure Limited was rebranded as Reliance Infratel in 2008. (in 2005 Reliance empire was divided between two brothers and since then Reliance’s telecom business was headed by Anil Ambani and rebranded as Reliance Communication or RCOM).
• In 2009 Vodafone created a new company Ortus Infratel Holdings to invest in Indus Towers.
• In May 2009 ATC India acquired Xcel Telecom.
• In November 2009 ATC India acquired Transcend Infrastructure.
• In 2009 Tata Tele’s tower arm Wireless Tata Telecom Infrastructure Ltd (WTTIL) merged with Quippo.
• In February 2010 ATC India bought Essar Telecom Infrastructure Ltd (ETIL).
• In March 2010 Quippo-WTTIL bought of Tata Tele (Maharastra)’s tower company 21st Century Infra Tele (TFCITL).
• In 2010 Quippo-WTTIL was rebranded as Viom Networks (Tata had 54% and SREI had 18%)
• GTL Infra bought towers of Aircel in 2010.

• In 2010 Aster Infra rebranded as Ascend Infrastructure. In 2011 Ascend Infra acquired India Telecom Infra Limited (ITIL).
• In 2011 TAIPA (Tower And Infrastructure Providers Association) was formed.

• In December 2015 debt-ridden RCom initiated talk with Tillman Global and TPG Asia for selling of Reliance Infratel, but failed.
• In April 2016 ATC India bought 51% share in Viom Networks. SREI group exited from tower biz. ATC-Viom merged entity was rebranded as ATC TIPL. 
• In December 2016 RCom went into a deal with Canada based Brookfield Asset Management to sell of 51% stake of Reliance Infratel. The new entity would be branded as Towercom Infrastructure
• In March 2017 Idea and Vodafone announced the merger and therefore they planned to sell out the standalone towers to third party.

• In September 2017 government of India made a plan to hive off BSNL's towers into a separate entity to be owned by public sector enterprise. 
• In the last week of October 2017 Brookfield stepped aside from the deal to buy off majority stake in R-Infra (owned by Anil Ambani).
• In November 2017 ATC Telecom Infrastructure Pvt. Ltd announced acquisition of a total of 20,000 towers from Vodafone Tower Holdings and Idea Cellular Infrastructure Services Ltd (ICISL) separately. (These towers are not from Indus Towers)
• November 2017: parent firm Bharti Airtel via its wholly owned subsidiary Nettle Infrastructure Investments sold 83 million equity shares aggregating to 4.49% stake in Bharti Infratel through a secondary share sale in the stock market. Consequent to the stake sale Bharti Airtel and Nettle together hold a combined 53.51% stake in Bharti Infratel.
• Jio agreed to buy towers from Reliance Infratel along with some spectrum and other wireless assets (December 2017).
• In January 2018 ATC applied to DoT to merge its Indian subsidiaries and invest another $ 1.2 billion.
• In March 2018 ATC completed merger of its 5 Indian subsidiaries (ATC India Tower Corp Pvt Ltd, ATC Tower Co. of India Pvt Ltd, McCoy Developers Pvt Ltd, Transcend Infrastructure Pvt Ltd, ATC Telecom Tower Corp Pvt Ltd) into ATC Telecom Infrastructure Pvt Ltd (ATC TIPL)
• April 2018 Vodafone completed sale of their standalone 10,200 towers to ATC for Rs 3850 Cr.
• In the middle of May 2018 Bharti Airtel has proposed a merger of Bharti Infratel and Indus Towers. The merged entity will be named as Indus Towers with 1,63,000 towers across 22 telecom circles of the country and with valuation of $ 14.6 billion (Rs 965,000 cr). That will be 2nd largest tower company after China Tower.
• In end of May 2018 Idea Cellular completed the sale of their standalone 9,900 towers to ATC at Rs 4,000 crore. 
• In October 2018, Tata sold 13% stakes and IDFC sold its total stakes in ATC TIPL to ATC. 
• In March 2019 Reliance Jio spined off its fiber and tower assets into two seperate infrastructure investment trusts (InvITs) - Jio Digital Fibre Pvt Ltd (JDFPL) and Reliance Jio Infratel Pvt Ltd. (RJIPL). RJIPL is owned by Reliance Industrial Investments and Holdings Ltd (51%) and RIL (49%). Jio Infratel had 45000 towers from Reliance Infratel (of RCom), and remaining 1,25,000 - 1,30,000 built by them. However many of them, nearly 25% of these towers are monopole, i.e. not suitable for tenants. Jio has target to built up 2,60,000 towers in next 6-12 months. 
• In April 2019 Tata Tele sold off remaining 13% stake to ATC. ATC will have 90% share in ATC TIPL now. 

• In June 2019 it has been heard that a consortium led by Brookfield Asset Management will buy Jio Infratel with 1,70,000 towers portfolio.
• In July 20, 2019 it has been disclosed that Canada's Brookfield Infrastructure Partners L.P. and its affiliates will buy Jio Infratel, tower arm of Jio in multi-phases. The investment value is Rs 25,215 crore ($3.66 billion). 
• In September 2019, it has been known that Indus Towers and Bharti Infratel is in final stages of merger. Post merger Bharti, Vodafone India and Birla backed Idea Cellular will cut down stakes in the entity. Experts assume that Sunil Mittal backed Bharti may also leave tower biz in a phased manner, in a longer time period. It's been in news that ATC and Brookfield are also eyeing for stakes in Indus+Bharti Infratel merged biz. 
• In December 2019 GIC (Singapore's sovereign wealth fund) and a group of investors including Brookfield Infrastructure Partners LP announced acquisition of Jio's tower assets of nearly 1,35,000 towers for Rs 25,200 crore. Government approval came in September 2020.

• Nov 21, 2020: Bharti Infratel & Indus Towers got merged - Vi sell out its 11.15% stake in the merged entity. Prior to the merger, shareholding in Indus Towers was Bharti Infratel (42%), Vodafone Group (42%), Idea Cellular (11.15%) and PS Asia Holding Investments (Mauritius) Limited or Providence Equity Partners (4.85%). 
• Post merger Bharti Airtel have 36.7%, Vodafone Group holds 28.12%, PS Asia Holding Investments (Mauritius) Limited (Providence) have 3.25%, Canadian pension fund CPPIB holds 2.17%, and US PE fund KKR owns 4.85% of Indus Towers. 
• Nov 26, 2020: Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approves that ATC can buy out Tata Group's 12.32% share in ATC India's subsidiary ATC TIPL. ATC would be spending Rs 2480 cr to mark Tata Group's exit from tower biz. 
• During anytime from October to December, 2020 Jio Infratel was rebranded as Summit Digitel. Jio Infratel was acquired by Canada-based Brookfield Infrastructure Partners LP, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund GIC and other institutional partners in September 2020. 

• December 2020, Summit Digitel joins Tower and Infrastructure Providers Association (TAIPA). 
• September 2021: TAIPA did a makeover as Digital Infrastructure Providers Association (DIPA)
• Q1 of 2022: Vodafone UK sold its 2.4 % stake in Indus via a block deal and another 4.7% to Bharti Airtel. Thus Vodafone UK raised Rs 3831 Cr, most of which reinvested in Vi. 

• August 2022: Canadian pension fund Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ) is in talks with Vodafone Plc to buy complete or partial stake of Vodafone Plc in Indus Towers (21%). The talks are in preliminary stage. Earlier Vodafone had talks with American Tower Co and Crown Castle International but nothing materialized.

• In April end, 2023 ATC India had talks with Canada's Brookfield (who owns Jio's tower assets under Summit Digitel branding) to sell 100% stake of Indian tower unit. ATC had talks with US infrastructure fund Stonepeak Partners, Macquarie and KKR & Co but response had been lukewarm. ATC initially wanted to sell 50% but no takers compelled them to think about full buyout. ATC has good number of cell sites across the country, but their main tetant is Vi, which has questionable future. Therefore the business in coming days could not be as profitable as now.

• End of June, 2023 we are getting updates that Florida based private equity firm I Squared Capital (https://www.isquaredcapital.com) may buy ATC India. ISC may buy 90% while New York based investment firm Stonepeak may buy remaining 10%. Or they both can bid for ATC India's complete buyout. The major concern in this buyout is difference in enterprise valuation - as Boston based ATC valuing its Indian arm at $ 4billion while ISC and Stonepeak could bid at $ 1.8-2.2 billion. ATC India (https://atctower.in/en/index.html) notes that ATC India has approx 78300 sites.