AIS earmarks up to Bt20 bn for spectrum licence bid next year

The NBTC announced recently that it had resumed developing the plan to auction licences for the 1,800- and 900-megahertz spectra, with the bidding expected to take place after July next year.

“We are also prepared to invest at least Bt40 billion in the new bandwidth if we win a licence, since we have already invested Bt80 billion for the 3G network over the past two years,” AIS chief executive officer Somchai Lertsutiwong said.

Somprasong Boonyachai, Intouch  Holdings CEO, said the new auction round should be a key factor to drive the economy. He said the NBTC auction would create more jobs, contributing to personal incomes, corporate tax and finally value-added tax. The longer the auction is delayed, the more effect it will have on the economy.

The first auction of 2.1-gigahertz licences in October 2012 saw total licence payments of Bt41.6 billion by the three bid winners, which would be transferred to the government. Advanced Wireless Network, an AIS subsidiary, tendered the highest bid at Bt14.6 billion to get one licence.

Currently AIS has only 15MHz of bandwidth on the 2.1GHz spectrum for its 44 million subscribers, while its concession contract with TOT on 900MHz is due to end next September. So AIS wants more bandwidth to offer mobile and data services to its customers, especially fourth-generation services, which its competitors already provide.

AIS is also eyeing a strategic partnership with TOT, as proposed by that state telecom agency with the private operators. Somchai said AIS was in the process of drawing up a plan for such a partnership, especially on mobile-phone and fixed-line broadband services.

AIS earlier announced an investment of Bt4.6 billion for the first, trial phase of a fixed-line broadband network. It is expected to secure around 100,000 broadband subscribers for the network, which has capacity for 300,000 subscribers, for the first phase next year.

“We plan to invest more than Bt10 billion for fixed broadband services if we find more demand,” Somchai said.

The AIS FibreNet trial will be launched in collaboration with some property developers to serve their residential projects. It will use VDSL (very-high-bit-rate digital subscriber line) and FTTx (fibre to the x) technology when it is officially launched early next year.

Somchai said the telecom industry’s revenue was expected to grow by only 1-2 per cent this year, compared with 3-4 per cent in 2013. AIS expects revenue growth of around 1.5 per cent this year.

For the third quarter this year, AIS reported that its service revenues improved by 1.5 per cent year on year to Bt28.9 billion, while total revenue rose by 2.6 per cent to Bt35.3 billion. EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation) for the three months ended September 30 climbed by 7.3 per cent year on year to Bt16.4 billion, while quarterly net profit increased by 7.4 per cent to nearly Bt 9 billion.