Our Telecommunications Group offers a full range of legal services to our clients. We have substantial experience with U.S. and international regulation of communications and broadcasts and are active in matters before the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, other administrative U.S. agencies, Congress, and non-U.S. regulatory bodies. We are sensitive to, and advise clients about, the complex interplay between the regulatory environment and the fast-changing business of communications. Additionally, we work closely with the firm's sophisticated practitioners in other practice areas, allowing us to provide vital advice regarding contractual, tax, securities, litigation and intellectual property matters.
Paul, Weiss’s client list includes U.S. and foreign telecom service providers, satellite operators, companies involved in the mobile phone business, communications equipment manufacturers, operators of advanced fiber-optic cable systems, cable television companies and networks, producers of television programming, and companies involved in developing hardware and software for computer and video applications. The firm also represents investors in all of these businesses, advising major investment banks, other financial institutions and private equity investors on a wide range of communications and technology matters. Our group has done extensive work on the full range of corporate transactions in the communications infrastructure industry, including mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, leasing agreements, capital markets and other financings, and corporate restructurings.
Recognition
Legal 500 US: Leading Firm in Telecoms and Broadcast: Transactions
- Consistently recognized as a leading firm for Telecoms and Broadcast: Transactions by Legal 500 US
- Two partners recognized as top practitioners for Telecoms and Broadcast: Transactions by The Legal 500
- Ravi Purohit Shortlisted for “Lawyer of the Year 2024” by TMT Finance
Recent Engagements
- American Tower Corporation in its $1.85 billion acquisition of Eaton Towers Holdings Limited and its $523 million acquisition of joint venture stakes from MTN Group Limited involving companies in Ghana and Uganda
- Funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management in the $7.5 billion acquisition of the incumbent local exchange carrier business of Lumen Technologies in 20 U.S. states to create Brightspeed
- Brightspeed, one of the nation’s largest fiber broadband builders and a portfolio company of Apollo Global Management, in a multibillion-dollar financing transaction, including $3.7 billion in new capital from its secured lenders and funds managed by Apollo
- Crown Castle in the combined $8.5 billion sale of its small cells business to EQT Active Core Infrastructure fund; and the sale of its fiber solutions business to Zayo Group Holdings and in the activist campaigns by Elliott Management and Boots Capital Management
- The strategic review committee of the board of directors of Frontier Communications in its $20 billion sale to Verizon Communications
- Grain Management in its $500 million sale of 400 wireless towers and assets to American Tower
- KKR in connection with Telefónica S.A. portfolio company Telxius Towers’ €7.7 billion sale of its telecommunications tower unit to American Tower Corporation and its €1.8 billion acquisition of a 37.5% stake in FiberCop S.p.A., a new unit of Telecom Italia
- Lendlease Group in the sale of a U.S. telecommunications platform to certain funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management
- Metro Communications in its inaugural securitization
- MetroNet in its co-investment by KKR and Oak Hill Capital and in its sale to a joint venture between T-Mobile and KKR
- Oak Hill Capital in numerous transactions including its acquisitions and investments in Greenlight Networks, Omni Fiber, Otelco, Oxford Networks, Race Communications and Wire 3
- Oak Hill Capital, GI Partners and ²’s management team in the $2.365 billion sale of Wave Broadband to RCN Telecom Services
- SBA Communications in its $975 million transaction under which Millicom International Cellular S.A. will sell to SBA and lease back a portfolio of approximately 7,000 towers across Central America
- United Group, a portfolio company of BC Partners, in the €1.22 billion sale of its Mobile Tower Infrastructure Business to TAWAL, its acquisition of Wind Hellas and its acquisition of Nova Broadcasting Group
- WaveDivision Capital and Searchlight Capital Partners in their $1.35 billion acquisition of Frontier Communications’ Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana operations