Tillman Infrastructure (TI), a tower and telecom infrastructure company with over 1,000 sites around the U.S., has named Suruchi Ahuja as Chief Executive Officer, effective on January 1. William “Bill” Hague, who previously held the role, is being appointed Vice Chairman. In his new role, Hague will assist the board in TI’s aggressive growth plans in the U.S.
In an exclusive interview with Inside Towers, Ahuja elaborated on several aspects of TI’s growth prospects. Since TI announced its 1,000th tower a year ago (see, Tillman Infrastructure Builds Its 1,000th Tower), the company added several hundred towers in 2021. With a committed construction pipeline of several thousand towers, TI expects to grow rapidly. “Our current line of sight is two to three times growth in a couple of years,” she says.
Ahuja is a TI founding member, having served as president and chief financial officer since August 2016. During her tenure as CFO over the past five years, she helped take the business from inception to successful relationships with major carriers in the U.S.
She clarifies that all of TI’s new towers are strictly build-to-suit and that the company is highly selective on acquisition opportunities. Moreover, it targets premium suburban, semi urban and rural markets. “There are a lot of opportunities in small markets or along interstate highways for densification,” Ahuja says. “Our goal is to serve the communities in which we operate; mainly those that have little or no access to infrastructure for some time.”
She adds that 15-20 years ago, tower companies were targeting “NFL” cities. “If you were not established in those markets, you couldn’t be successful. That situation has changed,” she points out. “Suburban and rural markets are our focus and will continue as long as there is still ongoing demand for 5G [wide area] coverage.”
When asked about diversification into other digital infrastructure assets, Ahuja explained that the company is not expanding outside of towers. “There are some advantages of having a mix of digital infrastructure under one roof but that requires a different skill set to manage that. Tillman Infrastructure’s focus is on macro towers. We are looking at some rooftop opportunities but no data centers,” she says.
Tillman Global Holdings (TGH) is TI’s lead shareholder and is a strategic investor across the digital infrastructure landscape. TI is able to leverage TGH’s deep expertise and industry relationships to unlock value and come up with industry-leading solutions.
“We have real estate that could be used for edge compute applications. We find that the most value can be created keeping the different verticals separate but under one overall umbrella, in our case that means under Tillman Global Holdings. It allows us to add value to our customers by solving problems across different forms of comms infrastructure while keeping each independent and focused,” she explains.
Still, Ahuja makes clear, “We have supportive shareholders and believe that to date we have differentiated ourselves in the market by being the best independent tower company to partner with. This has really been a key driver of our growth.”
She emphasizes, “We’re in an unprecedented time of network deployment and our belief is those companies who can be builders of infrastructure rather than just buyers will be value-add partners to the carriers.”
In addition to her role at TI, Ahuja is a partner at TGH, a New York-based global digital infrastructure investor, owner, and operator of over 6,000 towers in more than 20 countries with capital investment exceeding $5 billion. She also was responsible for raising over $1.5 billion of equity and debt capital to support the business.
Sanjiv Ahuja, TGH chairman says, “Suruchi has demonstrated strong vision, leadership and execution capabilities in her previous roles. In her new role, we are confident she is going to lead Tillman Infrastructure to unprecedented success as a leading player in this industry.”
By John Celentano, Inside Towers Business Editor
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