PLDT to spend historic amount of P78.4B in 2019, bulk for network & IT

PLDT Inc. said on Thursday  it plans to spend as much as P78.4 billion this year, chunk of which will be used to finance its network and information technology (IT) platforms.

"We're guiding capex (capital expenditure) at the number of P78.4 billion, which is an increase of P20 billion over the P58 billion realized in 2018," PLDT chairman and CEO Manuel Pangilinan told reporters in a press conference in Makati City.

PLDT allocated a capex of P58 billion in 2018, to finance the improvement of the company's broadband and data business units.

For this year, PLDT chief finance officer Anabelle Chua said most of the spending will be for technological advancements.

"Of the 87 (billion pesos), 48 billion (pesos) of that is what we call technology capex which is basically for our network and IT platforms," she explained.

"That's in line with what we did in 2018, so that's really the investment which will spur revenue growth," added Chua.

Aside from this, Chua said the company will also allocate another P16 billion for costs which will be incurred for customer needs.

"We have another P16 billion which is what we call business and customer capex. For every home that we connect, we basically spend for the last mile, the modems, the onus, and so since we don't charge the customer, that's a PLDT asset and a PLDT capex," she said.

"You can call it a bit of a variable capex that's really sales related. It won't incur unless there's a sale. If there's a sale, it will translate immediately," Chua elaborated.

PLDT is also set to spend as much as P4 billion which will be for the installation of customer requirements.

"There's another P3 to P4 billion that's a bit of one-time. We have hired a number of people both for our Home and Enterprise -- over 3,000 combined people that we are bringing in to basically handle the installation of customer requirements," Chua said.

"There are one-time capex for vehicles, laptops, tools, etcetera, so that's really not gonna be a recurring capex but for this year we expect that we'll have a one-time capex for that," she added.

Another P2 billion will also be allotted for the expansion of the company's data centers.

According to Pangilinan, most of the capex will be funded internally, and possibly from the sale of assets of the company.

"We obviously anticipate a bigger EBITDA (earnings before income tax, depreciation, and amortization) level in 2019. That will help a great deal of it," he said.

"There are still a few asset sales that may happen in the course of 2019 that may fund whatever will be needed," added Pangilinan.

While Pangilinan said there will be not much incremental debt, but PLDT currently has "much" headroom to borrow. —LDF, GMA News