IHS Nigeria Plc, which operates telecommunications infrastructure in three African countries, is set to more than double its assets after raising $1bn for investment, Chief Executive Officer Issam Darwish said.
According to a Bloomberg report, IHS wants to increase the number of telecommunications towers under its management to 20,000 by 2016 from the 8,500 towers it currently runs in Nigeria, Cameroon and Ivory Coast.
Darwish said in a telephone interview from Beirut, Lebanon’s capital, “We have funding available for various opportunities that we are currently analysing.”
The Lagos-based company said in July it raised $522m in new capital, $280m in debt and $242m in equity in the preceding year to fund its expansion across Africa.
Nigeria has Africa’s highest number of mobile-phone users, with 109 million subscribers at the end of 2012, according to the regulator Nigerian Communications Commission.
MTN Group’s Nigerian unit was the market leader with 47.4 million customers, followed by Nigeria’s Globacom with 24.1 million, New Delhi-based Bharti Airtel with 23.1 million, and Abu Dhabi-based Emirates Telecommunications Corporation, known as Etisalat, with 14.9 million, according to data on the NCC’s website.