MUMBAI: Telecom majors are preparing to fight a bloody war for market share in the 4G space and are lining up huge capital to participate in the upcoming spectrum auction.
Vodafone Group Plc has got a capital infusion of Rs 47,700 crore ($7.2 billion) in its Indian unit, making it the largest foreign direct investment (FDI) ever in India, as it readies to take on Reliance Jio.
“The equity infusion will enable Vodafone India to continue its investments in spectrum and expansion of networks across various technology layers,” Vodafone said.
Vodafone’s move comes ahead of India’s largest ever auction for spectrum, including for 700 megahertz (MHz). It may be recalled that telecom operators spent Rs 1.7 trillion in the previous two auctions of 2014 and 2015.
While the average broadband spectrum holding on a per circle basis for Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio is 22 MHz, in case of Vodafone it is just 5MHz. Vodafone is expected to bid aggressively.
Vodafone will also use the capital to bring the company’s net debt down.
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