Smart, Sun get more than half of PLDT’s P32-B capex

MANILA, Philippines - Dominant carrier Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) has earmarked more than half of its P32 billion capital expenditure program this year for its wireless arms Smart Communications Inc. and Digitel Mobile Philippines Inc. as cellular penetration rate in the country reached 108 percent.

In a report to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE), PLDT said about P17 billion of this year’s capital expenditures budget would go to Smart while P1 billion would go to DMPI.

The subscribers of Smart and Sun Cellular increased by 179,169, to 70.04 million last year mainly due to a combination of organic subscriber growth and multiple SIM card ownership.

PLDT explained the higher capital expenditures for its wireless units is in line with the expected surge in the volume of call as well as text messages as a result of marketing promotional activities.

 â€œWe expect to make additional investments in our core facilities to leverage existing technologies and increase capacity to accommodate expected continued increases in call and text volumes as a result of unlimited voice and text offerings and other promotions,” the company said.

PLDT said Smart would continue to expand and enhance its existing networks and platforms infrastructure particularly that of 3G (third generation) network.

“Smart’s capital spending is currently anticipated to focus on building out its coverage, leveraging the capabilities of its newly modernized network, expanding its transmission network, increasing international bandwidth capacity and expanding its 3G and wireless broadband networks in order to enhance its data transmission capabilities,” the company said.

On the other hand, PLDT said DMPI would further expand its mainstream services as it continues to integrate with the network of the PLDT Group since it was acquired from the JG Summit Holdings Inc. of taipan John Gokongwei a few years ago.

 â€œDMPI’s capital spending is currently anticipated to further expand its mainstream services and integration with the PLDT Group network of its core and transmission network to increase penetration, particularly in provincial areas to achieve greater business benefits from a closely synergized environment,” the company added.

With 20,770 cellular or mobile broadband base stations, the PLDT Group’s cellular network covers approximately 99 percent of all towns and municipalities in the Philippines .

On the other hand, parent firm PLDT would get P12 billion of the total P32 billion capital expenditures budget for this year.

“PLDT’s capital spending is currently intended principally to continue the build out and upgrade of its broadband data and IP infrastructures, its fixed line data services and to maintain its network,” it added. 

The remaining P2 billion budget for capital expenditures would be allocated to other subsidiaries of the PLDT Group.