26 April 2019

Nigerian firm Pan African Towers (PAT) and Canadian company WATT Renewable Corporation have signed a N7.2bn infrastructure investment financing agreement to address the energy needs of Nigeria’s telecoms industry.

Speaking at the signing ceremony in Lagos, chief operating officer and founder, WATT Renewable Corporation, Oluwole Eweje, said it is an infrastructurebased partnership in which his company will provide power supply to the tower firm.

Eweje said power accounts for about 70 per cent of the company’s operating cost (OPEX), adding that the mandate of WATT is to provide between 40 and 50 per cent savings.”

“So, part of what we are doing is we are using a combination of technology and conventional energy sources to provide power to (the) off-taker which is PAT,” he said.

“The offshoot of all of these is the socio-economic component of what we are doing. We are not just providing power to the business, part of what we are doing is that we are looking at using that as anchor station so that we can provide power to businesses within the country which currently do not have power.”

Eweje added that the partnership had been in the works for about a year before the final signing of the deal.

He said investors have committed to spending about N7.2billion (over USD20m) on the project.