The news:
- IHS Nigeria and related entities — subsidiaries of IHS Holding Limited (IHS Tower) — have announced that Airtel Nigeria has agreed to renew its existing partnership and increase its tenancies to nearly 10,000 in the next five years.
- Per the new arrangement disclosed on Wednesday, February 8, 2024, the Nigerian telco will extend the term of its existing tenancies, which are approximately 6,000, until December 2031.
- The deal will also see Airtel Nigeria, a subsidiary company of Airtel Africa, take up 3,950 new tenancies over the next five years. The bulk of them are expected to occur sometime between 2024 and 2025.
Furthermore, in alignment with Airtel Africa’s sustainability strategy launched in October 2021 and IHS Towers’ Carbon Reduction Roadmap targeted at cutting emissions intensity by 50% before 2030, the two companies have also committed to collaborating on new green initiatives on the collective sites moving forward.
The telecom infrastructure operator stated that the renewal and subsequent expansion of its partnership with Airtel Nigeria reflects its ongoing commitment to serving its customers and meeting Africa”s connectivity demands.
The telecom tower company also highlighted that Airtel Nigeria, with its parent company, has been a long-standing partner, as evidenced by their extensive collaborations in other African markets.
Sam Darwish, Chairman and CEO of IHS Towers, has described the expansion and renewal agreement with Airtel Nigeria as an avenue for his company to strengthen its collaboration to help “facilitate mobile connectivity in our largest market, supporting our customers in rolling out new sites throughout Nigeria.”
This deal follows recent news of IHS Nigeria’s completion of deploying more than 10,000km of fibre optic cables across Nigeria via its subsidiary Global Independent Connect Limited (GICL) as part of its Fibre-to-the-Tower (FTTT) strategy to facilitate the 5G introduction in the country and support the National Broadband Plan.
Besides the 5G amendments and build-to-suit sites, which are to be owned and managed by the Nigerian telecom tower company, the new Airtel-IHS arrangement also features 2,500 colocations.
IHS Towers claims to have almost 40,000 towers in Brazil, Cameroon, Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, Egypt, Kuwait, Nigeria, Peru, Rwanda, South Africa, and Zambia.
