Europe’s largest operators are scrutinizing their infrastructure asset strategies even more critically than usual in the current environment of high inflation and high borrowing costs. Despite the high cost of capital, many are becoming more infrastructure-centric than in recent years. They may give up on growth from new services and applications – always a high-risk strategy for conventional telcos – and seek financing from state funds or private equity investors. This will drive new acquisitions in Europe, and the potential for operators to ‘de-layer’ – to separate their various operations into autonomous groups to maximize returns and facilitate potential sales. Large operators tend to go through cycles of different asset ownership strategies. Sometimes the main trend is to reduce costs…