A consortium of funds led by Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) and KKR entered into a strategic co-control partnership with Vodafone GmbH for Vodafone's c. 81.7% stake in Vantage Towers AG. Vodafone will transfer its stake in Vantage Towers AG to a holding company, which will be indirectly co-controlled by Vodafone and the consortium. The consortium will obtain a shareholding of up to 50%. The holding will launch a voluntary public takeover offer for all outstanding free float shares of Vantage Towers AG comprising c. 18.3% of the share capital.
Hengeler Mueller advises KKR on the transaction. The team is led by partner Christian Schwandtner and includes partners Martin Ulbrich (both M&A, Düsseldorf), Markus Röhrig (Antitrust, Brussels) and Jan Bonhage (Public Law, Berlin), counsel Anja Balitzki (Antitrust) and Matthias Cloppenburg (Corporate) (both Düsseldorf) as well as associates Oda Goetzke, Lech Kopczyński (both M&A, Düsseldorf) and Anton Petrov (Public Law, Berlin).