Spanish telco looks to reach 1,300 cities with LTE by year-end
Spanish telecom operator Orange said it’s investing 1.5 billion euros ($1.61 billion) in its LTE network across the country. With the investment, the operator is looking to cover 85% of the Spanish population with LTE services by the end of this year and 95% of the population by the end of 2017.
Orange’s fiber network in Spain currently reaches 5.2 million households, with plans to reach 10 million households in 2016 and 14 million by the end of 2020. At that time, the telco’s fiber optic network is expected to cover 80% of all Spanish cities with more than 20,000 inhabitants.
“Only four months after the acquisition of Jazztel, the Orange Group is reinforcing its investments in Spain, consolidating the position of its subsidiary as Europe’s leading alternative operator in terms of fiber coverage,” the company said in a statement. “As a result of this deployment program the total accumulated investment in its [fiber-to-the-home] network, including all investments already made by Orange and Jazztel, will be between 1.5 [billion] and 1.7 billion euros.”
Both deployment programs are part of Orange’s strategy to invest in high-speed broadband networks to meet strong demand from customers for content and services.
At the end of the third quarter, Orange Spain reported 4.5 million LTE customers. The company’s quarterly revenue reached 1.21 billion euros, down 1.7% compared to the same quarter the previous year. Revenue from mobile services totaled 631 million euros, down 2.7% year-on-year.
In Spain, Orange provides LTE services using spectrum in the 1800 MHz and 2600 MHz bands, having launched LTE in July 2013.
