(Bloomberg) — PT Sarana Menara Nusantara is considering selling a minority stake in its telecommunication tower unit PT Profesional Telekomunikasi Indonesia and is seeking as much as $1 billion, according to people with knowledge of the matter.
Profesional Telekomunikasi, or Protelindo, as it is known, is working with a financial adviser on the sale of a 15% to 20% stake, the people said, asking not to be identified as the information is private.
The potential sale is targeting pension and infrastructure funds, they said.
Shares of Sarana Menara Nusantara jumped 4.6% on Thursday in Jakarta, their biggest advance in more than a month, snapping a seven-day losing streak and giving the company a market value of about 47 trillion rupiah ($3.2 billion).
Deliberations are ongoing and Sarana Menara Nusantara could decide not to proceed with a deal, the people said.
The company is always looking for alternative funding through debt and equity, and both types of financing are under discussion, Sarana Menara Nusantara and Protelindo President Director Ferdinandus Aming Santoso said in response to a query from Bloomberg News.
There has been a surge in telecommunications infrastructure deals in recent years as the coronavirus pandemic accelerated digitization trends.
Protelindo’s owners would join Globe Telecom Inc. in the Philippines, which is weighing selling around half of its tower portfolio in a deal that could be worth as much as $1.5 billion, while shareholders of Supernap Thailand are working with a financial adviser to help find a minority investor in the business, Bloomberg News reported this month.
Founded in 2003, Protelindo is the largest independent owner and operator of towers for wireless communications companies in Indonesia.
The company owns and operates about 29,011 telecommunication tower sites with more than 54,580 tenants in Indonesia, primarily in Sumatra, Java, Bali, Kalimantan and Sulawesi, according to its website.
Protelindo bought a 94% stake in rival firm PT Solusi Tunas Pratama in October for about $1.2 billion.
Sarana Menara Nusantara owns 99.99% of Protelindo, while Santoso has a single share, according to the tower company’s latest annual report.
A unit of Djarum Group, the Indonesian cigarette and banking conglomerate, owns 54.4% of Sarana Menara Nusantara.
(Updates with share movement in third paragraph.)
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