Telecom Giant XLSmart Surges Capex to $1.25 Billion in Aggressive 101-City 5G Expansion

SURABAYA, Investortrust.id — PT XLSMART Telecom Sejahtera Tbk (EXCL), the telecom carrier formed from the merger of Axiata Group’s XL Axiata and Sinar Mas Group’s Smartfren, is aggressively ratcheting up infrastructure spending, lifting its 2026 capital expenditure blueprint from Rp 15 trillion ($943.40 million) to Rp 20 trillion ($1.25 billion) to fund an accelerated 5G rollout.

The balance-sheet boost will accelerate the carrier’s commercial 5G network footprint across 101 cities and regencies nationwide before year-end, raising the target from an earlier projection of 88 municipalities. The revised expansion follows the activation of the operator's newly secured 2.6 GHz spectrum bands, which management transitioned into commercial service across all its operational 5G transmission towers within three weeks of winning statutory deployment clearance on Aug. 5, 2026.

Southeast Asia's telecom arena is locked in a capital-intensive race for high-speed network density as surging digital consumer habits, mobile streaming, and artificial intelligence integration drive mobile data consumption. By deploying $1.25 billion to activate sub-GHz deep-penetration frequencies alongside high-capacity mid-band spectrum, XLSmart is positioning to contest market leadership against state-controlled PT Telkom Indonesia's mobile unit Telkomsel and rival Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison, while capturing higher-margin enterprise and retail subscribers.

Accelerating 5G Footprint Across Secondary Corridors

The operator is already deploying commercial 5G coverage across more than 50 cities backed by roughly 15,000 dedicated 5G base transceiver stations (BTS), reaching approximately 23% of the national population as of the first half of 2026.

"We have agreed to expand coverage to 101 cities, with new markets such as Lombok and Malang coming online before the end of this year," said Shurish Subbramaniam, Director and Chief Technology Officer of XLSmart, speaking during a media gathering in Surabaya on Friday. "Within three weeks of receiving our licenses, all of our 2.6 GHz 5G sites were energized, marking an immediate turnaround from auction win to live transmission, and this rollout pace will continue well into next year."

The carrier is pairing newly licensed 700 MHz low-band frequencies for regional reach and indoor signal penetration with high-throughput 2.6 GHz channels deployed across dense urban nodes facing mobile network traffic spikes.

Backing Dual-Band Architecture Across 265,000 Towers

The expanded capital allocation directly finances technical operations across a national grid numbering more than 265,000 BTS installations, driving deep dual-band integration between legacy 4G systems and next-generation 5G hardware.

"We are not merely peppering 5G patches across random spots just to claim we have 5G," said Merza Fachys, Director and Chief Regulatory Officer of XLSmart, addressing reporters in Surabaya on Friday. "Our operational mandate is ensuring that 5G and 4G services run concurrently at the exact same physical cell locations to provide seamless quality."

Company leadership emphasized that the expanded investment envelope looks beyond dense metropolitan markets to shore up underserved secondary regions, widening digital connectivity to support regional business activities and digital trade across the archipelago.