MTN strikes $6.2B deal to acquire IHS Towers, taking full control of the company

18 February 2026

On today's Techpoint Digest, we look at MTN's $6.2 billion deal to acquire IHS Towers, Nigeria's data probe into Temu, and TikTok deleting 580K Kenyan videos following an AI sweep.

Selam,

Victoria from Techpoint here,

Here’s what I’ve got for you today:

MTN strikes $2.2B deal to acquire IHS Towers

Nigeria launches data probe into Temu

TikTok deletes 580K Kenyan videos after AI sweep

MTN strikes $6.2B deal to acquire IHS Towers

MTN

Remember this? MTN in talks to acquire remaining 75% of IHS

Here’s the latest on one of Africa’s biggest telecom moves, and it’s big news for the continent’s digital infrastructure. MTN Group, Africa’s largest mobile network operator by subscribers, has agreed to buy out the rest of IHS Towers for $2.2 billion in an all-cash deal, meaning it will take full control of the tower company it once partly spun off.

Under the terms of the deal, IHS shareholders will receive $8.50 per share in cash, a healthy 36% premium over the company’s recent share price, and a huge uplift compared with where the stock traded when its strategic review began back in March 2024. The IHS board has already given the merger its blessing, and key investors like Wendel, which stands to collect about $535 million from selling its stake, are backing the plan. Once complete, IHS will disappear from public markets and become a private unit under MTN.

So why does this matter? Right now, MTN leases most of the towers it uses across Africa from IHS, from Nigeria to South Africa and beyond, so owning them outright reduces long-term costs, increases operational flexibility, and helps the operator better control network rollout, including 5G and fibre expansions as data demand soars. The deal also reverses a trend from years ago, where MTN and other telcos sold tower assets to third-party firms to raise cash.

Ghana fines DStv GHC 10K daily over pricing data snub

The financing plan combines MTN’s existing roughly 24% stake in IHS, around $1.1 billion in MTN cash, another $1.1 billion from IHS’s own balance sheet, and a rollover of IHS debt. But this giant acquisition still needs approval from regulators and shareholders before closing later ...