Marc Ganzi’s DigitalBridge bought its stake in Wildstone, which owns and operates infrastructure for European billboards (pictured), at the beginning of 2020. But it expects to complete the sale to Antin in the third quarter of 2022.
Last month DigitalBridge reached an agreement with Deutsche Telekom to acquire 51% of its tower unit for US$17.5 billion.
Steven Sonnenstein, senior managing director at DigitalBridge Investment Management, said: “By investing in Wildstone’s billboard digitisation strategy and supporting its strategic acquisitions, DigitalBridge has enabled Wildstone to achieve substantial growth and significant market penetration on an accelerated basis.”
DigitalBridge did not say how much they bought the stake for back in 2020, and neither it nor Antin are saying how much the latest deal is worth.
Wildstone owns over 3,000 billboards in what it calls premium locations. DigitalBridge has worked closely with founder and CEO Damian Cox to turn many of them into digital billboards.
Cox said: “We are grateful to Steven and the entire DigitalBridge team for the resources and expertise they have provided over the past two years. Their support has been instrumental in enabling Wildstone to successfully grow while delivering on our mission to drive the digital evolution and shape the future of the outdoor media infrastructure market.”
Effectively, Wildstone will move from one digital infrastructure company to another.
Antin, led by Mark Crosbie and Alain Rauscher, has stakes in companies such as UK-based CityFibre, Eurofiber of Belgium and the Netherlands, FirstLight Fiber, based in Albany, New York, and Spanish wholesale fibre company Lyntia.
