Altice Europe unveils new Portuguese fibre wholesaler

Altice Europe has unveiled the creation of Fastfiber, the fibre wholesale outfit for Portugal formerly known as Altice Portugal FTTH.

The launch of the newly branded company follows the December 2019 acquisition by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners’ of a 49.99% stake in the fibre unit.

Altice says that Fastfiber is by far the largest FTTH wholesaler in Portugal with approximately four million FTTH homes passed at year-end 2019. Fastfiber comprises of all Altice Portugal/Meo’s fibre assets in Portugal including FTTH and dark fibre..

Fastfiber will sell wholesale services to all operators at the same financial terms, according to the company.

MEO will sell technical services to Fastfiber for the construction, maintenance and subscriber connection to the fibre network.

The Morgan Stanley Infrastructure deal values Fastfiber at €4.6 billion on a 100% basis representing an EBITDA multiple of 20x. Altice Europe received €1,573 million for the sale of 49.99% in Fastfiber. Further payments of €375 million in December 2021 and €375 million in December 2026 will follow, subject to some performance goals being met.

Altice Europe’s spin-off of its infrastructure business in Portugal is intended to help the group deleverage.

Altice sold a majority stake in its Portuguese cellular tower business Omtel to a consortium led by Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners and Horizon Equity Partners last year. In January it followed up with the sale of a further 25% stakein the venture to Spanish tower operator Cellnex for €200 million, ahead of the planned takeover of the whole unit by the Spanish company.