IHS Towers has postponed an initial public offering that would have valued the company at as much as $10 billion, Bloomberg reported citing people familiar with the matter.
The delay comes on the back of concern the sale may take place too close to an election in the home market of IHS Towers in Nigeria.
Africa’s largest tower company, whose shareholders include Goldman Sachs Group, Wendel and MTN Group was seeking to raise about $1 billion in New York.
The share sale may now be postponed until 2019, the sources said. A representative of IHS Towers declined to comment.
IHS Towers joins Helios Towers and Eaton Towers in deferring plans for a listing in 2018. All three had been seeking to cash in on a booming African phone-mast industry, boosted by rising wireless device use amid growing populations and a surge in mobile subscriptions on the continent.
The listing of Lagos-based IHS will be deferred until at least after the Nigerian presidential elections scheduled for February.
Investors are also seeking additional certainty around the planned sale of struggling HIS customer 9mobile, Nigeria’s fourth-biggest mobile-phone company, to Teleology, according to one of the people.
