The American Tower Corporation (ATC) has entered into an agreement to acquire the entire issued share capital of Essar Telecom Infrastructure Private Limited (ETIPL) through its Singaporean subsidiary, Transcend Infrastructure, for Rs 20 billion. As ETIPL has 4,450 towers, ATC has effectively paid about Rs 4.5 million per tower for the deal. This is marginally lower than what GTL Infrastructure reportedly paid for acquiring Aircel's tower business (Rs 4.8 million per tower).

The acquisition will make ATC the third largest independent tower company in the country with 6,950 towers. The transaction is subject to certain pre-completion requirements and is expected to be completed by mid-2010. Barclays Capital is the financial adviser to Essar for this deal.