Liquid Telecoms launches P7bn bond
Staff Writer | Friday June 30, 2017 17:21
The funds from the new financing are intended to support Liquid Telecom as it continues to rapidly scale and expand its network capabilities and service offering across Africa.
Through a combination of organic growth and acquisition, Liquid Telecom has built Africa’s largest independent fibre network, stretching over 50,000km and connecting more countries on a single network than any other.
The new financing package is also expected to help deliver long-term benefits to Liquid Telecom’s growing number of enterprise, carrier and retail customers, which currently includes over 113,000 customers across 13 countries of operation. Liquid Telecom serves businesses of all sizes through an extended service offering, which includes integrated software, cloud, hosting and connectivity capabilities.
“This is another important step for Liquid Telecom as we continue our journey to bring high-speed connectivity to more of Africa,” Nic Rudnick, Group CEO, Liquid Telecom said. “Through additional funding, we hope to be able to continue this period of accelerated growth for the group, enabling us to extend our network footprint across more of the continent.”
Last year Liquid and Botswana Power Corporation (BPC) entered into a joint venture under an agreement that entails the power utility leasing excess optical fibres from its network to Liquid Telecom, creating a new telecoms network provider with extensive reach across Botswana.
The joint venture, which will operate under the name Liquid Telecom Botswana, will enable BPC to make more effective use of its existing assets, while allowing Liquid Telecom to better serve the network needs of its wholesale and enterprise customers in the region.
BPC owns and operates an optical fibre cable network that is embedded on some of its high voltage transmission lines. This fibre network will be commercialised for the first time in order to provide network services across the country.
The use of BPC’s infrastructure will be granted to Liquid Telecom Botswana under an Indefeasible Right of Use Agreement (IRUA). Rather than taking any rental payments, the capital value of the IRUA will be used to purchase BPC’s equity stake, which is 42.5%. Liquid Telecom will be the majority stakeholder in Liquid Telecom Botswana.