Turk Telekom plans $799 million fixed-line investment in 2009

Turk Telekom told investors in November about its growth outlook and that it planned to spend 1.25 billion liras ($768 mln) to 1.45 billion liras ($891 mln) in the fixed-line unit in 2009. The company may even accelerate its plans to expand and rewire its lines after copper prices declined, Bloomberg quoted Chief Executive Officer Paul Doany as saying in an interview.

“We’d rather build as much as we can before the prices begin recovering,” Doany said. Copper, which is used for phone cables, fell 54 percent last year, the most since at least 1987. The investment figure doesn’t include expenses or the license fee for its mobile-phone unit’s high-speed wireless network.

Turk Telekom will this year need to make a payment of 252 million euros ($334 million), including taxes, to the Turkish government after its unit Avea Iletisim Hizmetleri AS won a license to operate a 3G network in a Nov. 28 auction. According to the report, Doany did not say how much Avea would need to spend on its 3G network.

The company targets as much as 25 percent growth in mobile- phone sales this year. Avea will continue to aim for revenue growth and protecting its growing profit margins, he was quoted as saying.

Turk Telekom has gained 18 percent this year in Istanbul trading.

HIGH GROWTH IN INTERNET

Doany also forecasts 20 percent growth in the high-speed Internet market this year, spurred by the government’s decision to cut the Internet communications tax to 5 percent from 15 percent this year and competition that increases overall demand, Bloomberg said.

Turk Telekom also leads the high-speed Internet connection market in Turkey with more than 90 percent of market share.

The company will charge other Internet service providers less than its own unit to use its infrastructure, the report said. That policy of “positive discrimination” will continue until Turk Telekom’s market share falls to 80 percent or less, Doany told Bloomberg.