SoftBank Creates Venture to Buy 8,000 Cellular Sites Across U.S.
October 17 2017 - 12:32PM
Dow Jones News
By Drew FitzGerald
Japanese telecom giant SoftBank Group Corp. plans to form a
joint venture with Australia's Lendlease Group to buy about 8,000
cellular sites across the U.S., challenging tower operators that
dominate the industry.
Most of the infrastructure will initially come from Sprint
Corp., which is selling its interest in rooftop transmitters and
other sites to the joint venture, according to Lendlease. SoftBank,
which owns about 80% of Sprint's outstanding shares, has struggled
to turn the carrier into a profitable business since it took a
controlling stake in the company in 2013.
SoftBank and Lendlease will each initially contribute $200
million toward the new infrastructure company, called Lendlease
Towers, with plans to snap up $5 billion of telecom assets "over
the medium term" as the venture grows, a Lendlease spokesman
said.
The backers didn't say how much of that future commitment they
plan to fund themselves but said they are seeking more capital
partners. A Sprint spokesman wasn't immediately available for
comment.
--Ryan Knutson contributed to this article.
Write to Drew FitzGerald at andrew.fitzgerald@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
October 17, 2017 12:17 ET (16:17 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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