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Indonesian operator is looking to sell 2,000-2,500 mobile towers to pay down debt.
XL Axiata has received a number of offers for the portfolio of mobile towers it has put up for sale, according to local press reports.
The Indonesian operator is selling up to 2,500 towers and bidding began last week, the Jakarta Post reported on Thursday.
The paper quoted XL Axiata’s finance director Mohamed Adlan bin Ahmad Tajudin as saying his company has received both formal and informal offers for the towers.
However, he was unable to share how many offers have been tabled or to give further details at this stage, noting that the company is bound by confidentiality agreements with the bidders.
XL Axiata has around 6,500 mobile towers and is working on the sale of 2,000-2,500 of them.
Adlan declined to comment on the sum XL Axiata expects to raise from the sale, but referred the paper to its 2014 towers sale that raised 5.6 trillion rupiah (€368 million).
The telco sold 3,500 towers to specialist firm Solusi Tunas Pratama, which works out at a cost of around IDR1.6 billion per tower. At a similar price, the telco could thus expect to generate IDR3.2 trillion-IDR4 trillion from this latest sale, the paper said.
It aims to use the proceeds to pay down debt.
According to the report, Tower Bersama Infrastructure is interested in acquiring the towers, but has not disclosed whether it has submitted a formal offer, while Inti Bangun Sejahtera admitted it is considering making a bid.
