The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System’s infrastructure arm, along with Allianz Capital Partners and Axa Investment Manager’s real assets service, is taking on a 49.9 per cent stake in SFR FTTH, a French fibre optic infrastructure company.
The newly incorporated company, formed by Altice France, currently services one million homes, and that’s set to grow to five million in low and medium density areas of France. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2019.
Read: OMERS’ infrastructure arm ups stake in British utilities company
“The partnership with Altice fits OMERS Infrastructure’s strategy of acquiring high-quality infrastructure businesses that provide essential services, and generate steady cash flows to meet the long-term pension commitments of the OMERS plan,” said Ralph Berg, global head of infrastructure at OMERS, in a press release.
The transaction also marks OMERS’ entry into the French telecommunications market, noted Philippe Busslinger, head of Europe at OMERS Infrastructure, in the release. “We look forward to working together with Altice to deploy optic fibre infrastructure across French local communities. This partnership will ultimately enable high-speed fibre connectivity to millions of households in France.”