Posted on November 21, 2023 at 11:15 am
PARIS, Nov 21 (Reuters) – Patrick Drahi-led media and communications group Altice announced on Tuesday the sale of a 70% stake in its data center business in France to Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners.
These activities will be consolidated under a new entity called UltraEdge, which has an enterprise value of €764 million, Altice noted in a press release.
UltraEdge includes 257 data centers and office spaces currently managed by SFR across France.
Passive data center infrastructure and equipment will be moved to UltraEdge, and active servers and equipment will remain with SFR, Altice specifies.
The Group also announces that SFR will enter into a construction contract with UltraEdge which will generate additional revenues of approximately €175 million for the telephone operator over the next seven years.
The agreement is scheduled to be concluded, subject to obtaining licenses related to this type of transaction, in the first half of 2024.
In September, Altice commissioned several investment banks to conduct a review of its assets in Europe in order to conduct possible sales to reduce its debt, which then amounted to $60 billion.
The group was weakened this summer after Armando Pereira, Patrick Drahi’s main collaborator, was arrested in Portugal on suspicion of corruption.
Then, last August, Patrick Drahi committed to reducing the debt of Altice France, one of the three entities of his media and communications empire, by raising three billion euros “one way or another.” (Writing by Kate Entringer, editing by Blandine Henault)
