kkr  co and global infrastructure partners llc have agreed to form a joint venture with vodafone group plc to steer germanys mobiletowers company vantage towers ag leveraging vodafones controlling stake in the firm and its extensive portfolio of mobilephone towers the ukbased telecommunications giant said wednesday that the joint venture will own its 817 stake in vantage towers kkr and global infrastructure partners will build a stake of up to 50 in the joint venture by acquiring shares from vodafone in cash the partners will make a takeover proposal for the outstanding shareholders of vantage towers at eur3200 per share giving vantage towers an equity value of 162 billion euros 1632 billion vodafone expects to make between eur32 billion and eur71 billion depending on the takeup of the takeover proposal it said we believe vantage towers highquality footprint and network across the region ideally position it to meet the evergrowing demand for mobile connectivity in europe said vincent policard partner and cohead of european infrastructure at kkr we have a shared goal of creating a paneuropean telecoms champion by continuing to grow and develop the business leveraging the consortiums significant telecoms infrastructure investment experience and global resources he said founded in 2020 vantage towers listed in frankfurt in march 2021 the company has a network of about 83000 tower sites across ten countries vantage towers said it welcomed the partnership with vodafone and the infrastructure investors and recommended that shareholders accept the takeover offer the telecommunications sector has seen a flurry of deal making in recent years brookfield infrastructure partners lp and digitalbridge group inc agreed in july to buy a stake in deutsche telekom ags tower business for roughly eur66 billion the vantage towers deal which is conditional on regulatory clearances and is expected to close in the first half of 2023 has the support of rrj capital vantage towers second largest minority shareholder owning 24 of shares this transaction successfully delivers on vodafones stated aims of retaining cocontrol over a strategically important asset deconsolidating vantage towers from our balance sheet to ensure we can optimize its capital structure and generate substantial upfront cash proceeds for the group to support our priority of deleveraging vodafone chief executive nick read said vodafone said it expects the deal to have a slightly dilutive effect on its adjusted earnings per share and free cash flow it will use the money from the sale of its interest to reduce debt vodafone shares at 1054 gmt were down 15 at 10469 pence vantage towers shares were up 11 at eur3250 write to ian walker at ianwalkerwsjcom and mauro orru at mauroorruwsjcom mauroorru94