Telecom Italia has unveiled the details of a three-year business plan for 2015-2017 that envisages total investments of around EUR 10 billion in Italy and over EUR 4 billion in Brazil. The investment earmarked for the operator’s domestic market includes around EUR 5 billion for what it describes as innovative developments (NGN, LTE, cloud computing, data centres, transformation activities and TI Sparkle, the company’s international operator). One of the main objectives of the plan is to expand fibre-optic coverage to reach 75 percent of the Italian population by 2017 at a cost of EUR 2.9 billion. In addition, the operator will allocate EUR 900 million to accelerate 4G deployment to reach over 95 percent of the country’s population over the next three years.
The domestic investment programme also includes EUR 500 million for the creation of new data centres to support cloud services and innovative IT systems, plus EUR 200 million for the development of international fibre connections via TI Sparkle. Finally, EUR 500 million will be allocated to so-called transformation activities, with a view to simplifying and upgrading the company’s infrastructure and achieving a structural reduction in operating costs. Telecom Italia said its business plan, together with provisions introduced in prime minister Matteo Renzi's emblematic Jobs Act, will result in the company hiring around 4,000 new workers over the next four years. In the three-year plan, the company also confirmed a previously set target to stabilise domestic Ebitda by 2016 and increase it in 2017.
In Brazil, total investments over the 2015-17 period will be increased to BRL 14 billion (over EUR 4 billion), allowing the company’s local unit, TIM Brasil, to expand 4G coverage to over 15,000 localities, and 3G coverage to over 14,000 localities within the next three years.
