Popular Africa Telecommunication company, Airtel Africa has disclosed that it is considering a stock market flotation in London to reduce existing debt.
The company says it is looking to raise $1 billion through an initial public offering on the London Stock Exchange, offering 25% of its shares.
In a statement to the Bombay Stock Exchange, the company said;
“In furtherance to our previous intimations in this regard, we wish to inform you that Airtel Africa, a subsidiary of the company, has announced its potential intention to undertake an initial public offering for listing its equity shares on London Stock Exchange,”
The company may also follow the footsteps of MTN Nigeria, by listing on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).
$1.25 billion has earlier been raised: Airtel in 2018 raised $1.25 billion from six global investors including SoftBank Group Corp, Warburg Pincus LLC and Temasek Holdings (Private) Ltd.
The company also raised another $200 million from Qatar Investment Authority in March of the same year, which helped in reducing the company’s debt to $4 billion in March from $7.7 billion in 2018.
Airtel CEO, Raghunath Mandava, in a statement said;
“The 14 countries where we operate offer strong GDP growth potential and have young and fast-growing populations, low customer and data penetration and inadequate banking infrastructure,
“These fast-growing markets provide us a great opportunity to grow both our telecom and payments businesses.”
Listing date: Airtel Africa will list in two months time and BofA Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan, and Citigroup have been appointed as joint global coordinators and joint bookrunners.
Absa Group, Barclays, BNP Paribas, Goldman Sachs International, HSBC and The Standard Bank of South Africa will also act as joint bookrunners if the offer proceeds.
