Airtel to do Rs 27,000-28,000 crore capital expenditure for 5G network

29 Dec 2022 , 10:42 AM

According to a company official, telecom operator Bharti Airtel plans to invest Rs27,000-28,000 crore in telecom network with a focus on 5G rollout.

While the company intends to increase capital expenditure by 10-15%, it has no plans to charge a premium rate for 5G services because it has failed in several countries that have attempted to do so.

Previously, the company’s annual average capex was in the range of Rs 24,000-25,000 crore. According to the official, capex is primarily spent on radios (mobile antennas), fibre, broadband, enterprise technology data centres, and so on.

According to telecom ministry data, Bharti Airtel has deployed 3,293 5G base stations as of November 26.

Bharti airtel assumes that mobile services rates will shoot up in the near future, however, the range of increase will depend entirely on the market dynamics.

The telco operator has raised the price of its minimum recharge for 28 days mobile phone service plan in Haryana and Odisha by about 57% to Rs155. The company has discontinued its Rs99 minimum recharge plan, which included 200 megabytes of data and calls at Rs2.5 paise per second.

Within the next six weeks, the company will have a clear picture of the pilot and will take requests for its expansion into other telecom circles.

Reportedly, the company also do not want to charge any premium pricing for 5G, as it has not worked anywhere in the world.

At around 10.27 AM, Bharti Airtel was trading at Rs802.70, down by 0.14% against previous close of Rs803.80 on NSE. So far, the counter hit an intraday high and low of Rs810.90 and Rs760,10 respectively.

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