Allen & Overy has won the key role advising on phonemast company Arqiva's £6bn dual-track process that could either see the company sold or floated on the London Stock Exchange.

Arqiva operates more than 8,000 phone masts around the UK, in addition to owning terrestrial television and radio broadcasting infrastructure. In 2016, it had revenue of £884.7m and an operating profit of £271.1m.

According to Sky News, the company, which is owned by investors including the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and the Australian bank Macquarie, has appointed a syndicate of banks to advise on a possible stock market flotation.

In tandem, Arqiva's owners are also lining up a possible sale with a number of infrastructure investors understood to be interested.

A&O has won the key role advising Arqiva, with infrastructure partner Richard Evans and equity capital markets partner James Roe taking the lead role.

Global managing partner Andrew Balheimer is also involved in the deal as the firm's relationship partner for Arqiva.

It is understood that Linklaters, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Ashurst have also won roles advising consortia interested in acquiring Arqiva.

Freshfields is acting for a consortium comprising fund manager Arcus Infrastructure Partners and Canadian pension fund manager PSP, while Ashurst is representing Canadian asset manager Brookfield. It is understood that Linklaters is advising Hong Kong-listed infrastructure company CK Infrastructure Holdings.

Arqiva's in-house legal team is led by general counsel Michael Giles, who was appointed to the role in 2016. He previously held senior legal and commercial roles at NTL Business and NTL Broadcast.

A&O's infrastructure team recently advised Australian bank Macquarie on its £2.3bn acquisition of the Green Investment Bank from the UK Government.

Freshfields, Linklaters and Ashurst declined to comment.

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