Bell is putting its wireless towers into a new company and selling just under half of it. La Caisse, the Quebec pension fund manager, will pay $2.45 billion for a 49.9% stake in the company, called TowerCo for now, BCE announced Tuesday morning. That values TowerCo at about $4.91 billion.
What’s in the deal
- The towers: more than 5,000 of Bell’s sites across Canada, the “passive” part of the network: the towers and structures that antennas hang on.
- What Bell keeps: a 50.1% controlling stake, its spectrum, all of its active network equipment, and the land it owns. Bell will still report TowerCo’s results as part of its own.
- How it works: TowerCo, based in Montréal, will lease space on the towers back to Bell under long-term agreements, and build new sites for Bell as needed. It also plans to rent space to other carriers.
- Timing: closing is expected in the first quarter of 2027, pending regulatory approvals.
BCE CEO Mirko Bibic said the partnership “unlocks the significant value embedded in our infrastructure assets.”
Why Bell is doing it
The money is about the balance sheet. BCE says the proceeds support its plan to strengthen its finances, and repeats its target of a net debt leverage ratio of 3.5x by the end of 2027, a measure of debt against earnings. TowerCo itself is expected to start with no debt.
It’s the same playbook Telus used. Last year, Telus sold 49.9% of its tower company, Terrion, to the same buyer for about $1.26 billion, valuing it at over $2.5 billion. Terrion has nearly 3,000 sites. Bell’s deal is close to twice the size on both counts.
| Telus (Terrion) | Bell (TowerCo) | |
|---|---|---|
| Stake sold to La Caisse | 49.9% | 49.9% |
| Price | ~$1.26 billion | $2.45 billion |
| Implied value | over $2.5 billion | ~$4.91 billion |
| Sites | nearly 3,000 | more than 5,000 |
| Closed | Sept. 2025 | expected Q1 2027 |
Bell cut its dividend by more than half in 2025 under debt pressure, iPhone in Canada notes, and all of the big carriers have been looking for cash after years of spending on spectrum and fibre.
Why it matters: For Bell customers, nothing changes right away: Bell still runs the network and owns the spectrum. The bigger question is competition. Both Telus and Bell now say their tower companies will rent space to other carriers. If smaller providers can get onto more existing towers instead of building their own, that helps them expand coverage. If not, the deals mostly move money around the carriers’ balance sheets.