Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Inc. completed the acquisition of Lightpath fiber enterprise business unit of Altice USA, Inc..
December 01, 2020
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Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partner agreed to acquire 49.99% of Lightpath fiber enterprise business unit of Altice USA, Inc. (NYSE:ATUS) on July 28, 2020. MSIP will acquire the business for an implied enterprise value of $3.2 billion. Altice USA will receive total gross cash proceeds of approximately $2.3 billion from the sale and related financing activity (net cash proceeds of approximately $1.1 billion after tax and initial debt repayment). Altice USA will retain a 50.01% interest in Lightpath and maintain control of the company. Upon closing, Lightpath will be financed independently outside of the CSC Holdings, LLC debt silo. The transaction represents a multiple of 14.6x FY 2019 Adjusted EBITDA. The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals. As of October 21, 2020, The European Commission has given the antitrust approval for the transaction. The transaction is expected to close in fourth quarter of 2020. A portion of the net proceeds after tax are expected to be used by Altice USA to repay debt such that the transaction is at least leverage-neutral to CSC Holdings, LLC. Remaining proceeds may be used for additional debt paydown and/or repurchase of Altice USA shares. Gregoire Baudot, Jason Tofsky and Graeme Birrell of Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC acted as financial advisor to Altice USA. Scott Petepiece, Derrick Lott, Jessica Delbaum, Alan S. Goudiss, Jordan Altman, Richard Alsop, Gillian Emmett Moldowan and John Beahn of Shearman & Sterling LLP, Jason Bazar, Lucas Giardelli, Zal Kumar of Mayer Brown LLP, Laurent Borey of Mayer Brown France and Michael Kazakevich of Ropes & Gray LLP acted as legal advisors to Altice USA. Evercore acted as financial advisor and David Lieberman, Ravi Purohit, Nancy L. Mehlman, David E. Rubinsky, Lori E. Lesser, Jeffrey E. Ostrow, Adeeb R. Fadil, Timothy Gallagher, Brian M. Steinhardt and David J. Greene of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP served as legal advisor for Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC acted as financial advisor to Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Inc.
Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Inc. completed the acquisition of Lightpath fiber enterprise business unit of Altice USA, Inc. (NYSE:ATUS) on December 1, 2020.
Altice USA, Inc. is a broadband communications and video services provider in the United States, delivering broadband, video, mobile, proprietary content and advertising services to residential and business customers across 21 states through its Optimum brand. The Company has presences primarily in the New York metropolitan area and various markets in the south-central United States through a fiber-rich hybrid-fiber coaxial broadband network and a fiber-to-the-home network. The Company offers news programming and advertising services. It operates a4, an advanced advertising and data business, which provides audience-based, multiscreen advertising solutions to local, regional and national businesses and advertising clients. It offers hyper-local, national, international and business news through its News 12 and i24NEWS networks. It also offers managed services, including hosted private branch exchange, managed Wi-Fi and network security for small and medium-sized business customers.
ALTICE USA, INC. 
