Atlantic Tele-Network is expanding into a new business: it has acquired commercial distributed generation solar power company Green Lake Capital, for $103 million.
It will form a new subsidiary, Ahana, based in San Francisco, which will operate 28 commercial solar projects at 59 sites with an aggregate 45.7 megawatts of electricity generating capacity. Customers include high-credit quality corporates, utilities, schools, and municipalities, and current power purchase agreement terms range from 10 to 25 years, with a weighted average life remaining of 14.4 years.
“This investment is an excellent opportunity to expand our business and generate attractive returns for investors,” said Michael Prior, CEO of the ATN. “We believe that it is much like the investment we initially made in our wholesale wireless and fiber operations, in that it is an extensive, high quality infrastructure-based business with solid cash flows and the potential for expansion and higher returns through additional investment. While we continue to invest in our telecommunications businesses, our ownership of Ahana is an opportunity to expand critical infrastructure investment in an industry that is fragmented but rapidly expanding and evolving through an acquisition that has both solid cash producing facilities and high credit quality customers. We have investigated solar and other energy solutions as a way to lower power costs or to allow us to build in areas with poor or limited conventional power sources. This transaction provides us with an important growth platform and an entrepreneurial, yet disciplined management team under whose leadership we expect to leverage our initial investment by developing new projects.”
