IHS Holdings talk up $7bn potentially largest African firm US listings via IPO

IHS Holding Limited, Africa’s wireless towers operator, has given hint yet that it is exploring a potential registered initial public offering in the U.S, a deal which could be regarded as the biggest listing ever by an African company in the United States, shareholder Wendel SE said on Tuesday.

IHS Holdings on August 14, 2020, flagged the listing, stating that “the timing, number of shares to be offered and price range of the proposed offering was yet to be determined, as any proposed offering would commence after the completion of a customary U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission review process of a registration statement relating to the proposed offering and subject to market and other conditions”.

The planned IPO is one of at least two big tower offerings that are in the works.

It had been reported in February by Bloomberg that IHS Holding had selected Citigroup Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. as global coordinators for a listing that could value Africa’s largest operator of wireless towers at as much as $7 billion. Thus, data compiled by Bloomberg revealed that at that amount it would be the largest IPO in the U.S. by an African company.

In addition to Wendel, a French buyout firm, IHS’s owners comprise Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and South African wireless carrier MTN Group Ltd. Bloomberg also reported on how the company began reviving work on the sale of a share in late 2019 after scrapping strategies back in 2018 owing to electoral and political uncertainties in Nigeria, its main market.