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ublicly listed media conglomerate PT Global Mediacom plans to spend no less than US$100 million on capital expenditure (capex) this year to expand its various media businesses, ranging from pay TV to Internet broadband.

Global Mediacom chief financial officer Oerianto Guyandi said on Wednesday the capex would be use to support the expansion of the firm'€™s subsidiaries.

'€œTotal capex for all of our businesses may go higher than $100 million this year,'€ he told reporters after a shareholders'€™ meeting.

Oerianto explained that his firm would spend around $20 million on its free-to-air television business '€” operated by Media Nusantara Citra (MNC) '€” and between $75 million and $80 million for its pay TV business operated by MNC Sky Vision.

MNC, which runs free-to-air stations RCTI, Global TV and MNC TV, started constructing new integrated buildings and news centers last year.

The capex for MNC Sky Vision, will be used to add decoders and update equipment to improve the number of channels in an attempt to lure more customers.

Sky Vision successfully increased its market share to 75 percent, or 2.53 million subscribers last year, from 74 percent or 2.3 million subscribers in 2013.

The operator of pay TV channels Indovision, Top TV and Okevision, currently has 141 channels.

The pay-TV provider aims to pocket a 10 percent increase in revenues, totaling to Rp 3.6 trillion ($274.02 million) this year from Rp 3.28 trillion last year.

Besides developing its free-to-air and pay TV businesses, Global Mediacom will also expand its fiber optic broadband business '€” which is operated by MNC Kabel Mediacom, popularly known as Play Media.

'€œWe will spend around $180 million to $200 million in the next two to three years for Play Media,'€ Oerianto said.

Play Media, which provides paid Internet services to households, targets to have 700 million homes subscribed this year, he added.

'€œWe hope that our subscribers will increase to 1.5 million in three to five years,'€ he went on, adding that the investment for each home subscriber was around $120.

The capex for Play Media will come from syndicated bank loans that were obtained by the firm, he said.

Oerianto said his firm found it difficult to estimate what kind of revenue growth it would book this year, since the macroeconomic environment was unfavorable.

The country'€™s economic growth hit 4.7 percent in the first quarter of this year, far lower than the government'€™s target of 5.7 percent by yearend.

Analysts say weak economic growth will affect most businesses as consumers will likely become more prudent about spending their money on less critical goods and services.

Global Mediacom, which is owned by tycoon Hary Tanoesoe-dibjo, booked a 9.5 percent increase in revenues to Rp 2.66 trillion in the January-March period of this year from Rp 2.43 trillion in the same period last year.

The firm'€™s net profit, however, slumped by 70.3 percent year-on-year to Rp 90.45 billion from Rp 304.45 billion, mainly due to foreign exchange loss of Rp 305.18 billion.