Jan 4 Reuters Brookfield Asset Management will buy American Tower Corp39;s ATC lossmaking Indian operations for 2.5 billion, it said Friday, becoming the country39;s largest operator of telecom towers amid booming demand for data and wider use of 5G services.

The acquisition is the biggest of Brookfield39;s three telecomrelated deals in the roughly four years the Canadian company has been present in India, the world39;s secondlargest market by number of subscribers.

ATC, on the other hand, will exit India after nearly 17 years. Its fortunes have floundered due to the struggles of top client Vodafone Idea and it recently wrote down the value of the business by 322 million.

Brookfield, whose socalled anchor client is Reliance Industries39; Jio, will be in a better position to manage the challenge that ATC had with high exposure to Vodafone Idea, said Vivekanand S, an analyst at Ambit Capital Research.

Jio and Vodafone Idea compete with Bharti Airtel in the Indian telecom market where, according to an Ericsson report, the number of 5G subscribers will quadruple by 2027, accounting for 40 of the total base, from 11 in 2023.

Airtel is the anchor client of Indus Towers, the current market leader with roughly 193,000 towers. Brookfield has around 157,000 towers and ATC operates some 77,000 towers.

The presence of Airtel, said Vivekanand, means Brookfield39;s deal to buy ATC will not threaten Indus Towers.

Indus Towers became India39;s biggest telecom towers company in…