Abertis Telecom Terrestre, the telecommunications subsidiary of Abertis, has agreed to acquire 90% of the shares of WIND Telecomunicazioni S.p.A.'s fully owned subsidiary, Galata.

The transaction includes Galata's tower business consisting of its relevant functions, 7,377 towers and related contracts. The firms have agreed to close the transaction for a cash consideration of €693 million (US$775.5 million).

The remaining 10% of the shares of Galata will remain in the hands of WIND. The agreement foresees that the closing of the transaction will take place before the end of April 2015.

This package includes 7,377 mobile telephone towers of high quality and profitability as a result of their strategic nature in deploying broadband services using 4G technology. Almost 70% of the sites acquired are located in urban areas.

The acquired company is expected to generate around €200 million in revenue in the first full year of operations. These figures represent a major leap of more than 40% in Abertis Telecom Terrestre's revenue, while the telecom business (mobile phone infrastructures) will raise its share up to close to 50% of total revenues. Close to 35% of these will be generated, as well, outside Spain.

Abertis Telecom Terrestre will finance the transaction by means of available credit lines and new debt, therefore no additional financial resources will be required from Abertis.

The agreement includes a tower services agreement for these sites with WIND for period of 15 years, renewable for an additional period of 15 years, and foresees the deployment of additional sites that will allow the company to accelerate the offer of new broadband services in mobility.

The agreement will transform Abertis Telecom Terrestre, making it the largest European operator of telecommunications infrastructure for mobile telephony and audiovisual broadcasting. Following this acquisition, the Abertis subsidiary will have a portfolio of more than 15,000 towers, including 7,800 mobile telephone towers in Italy and 4,600 mobile telephone towers and 3,400 towers allocated for audiovisual broadcasting in Spain.

In October 2014, Abertis announced that, within the framework of its 2015-2017 strategic plan, it is studying the admission to trading of its terrestrial telecommunications subsidiary in the first half of 2015, which, in any case, would be subject to market conditions.