Indus Towers, one of the largest telecom infrastructure companies in the country is confident that in the near-to-medium term, 4G and 5G rollout from Vodafone Idea will improve its earnings. Vodafone Idea (Vi) is the largest customer of Indus Towers. Earlier, due to cash crunch, Vi wasn't able to make payments to Indus on time. However, now, after raising several billion dollars, Vi is in a much better position to increase capex and also pay off the dues.
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Indus said that Vi has been paying current monthly dues on time, and there's no default there. The older dues are also being sorted out by the telco. The doubtful receivables of the company have come down from Rs 5,386 crore at the end of March 2024 to Rs 3,548 crore as of September 2024. This is because Vi has been slowly clearing the past dues.
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is currently working out a way to see if there can be a scenario where telcos could be exempted from paying bank guarantees (BGs). If that happens, then Vi would be in an even better position to not only invest more in its networks but also on paying off dues.
With a fresh network rollout planned by Vi for both 4G and 5G, Indus is expecting a much better earning in the near future.
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"As our major customers continue to roll out, I believe this growth will continue. In fact, if you see over the last one and a half years, because of a strong tower rollout, we will remain the prime candidate to make sure we capture this growth," said Vikas Poddar, Chief Financial Officer, Indus Towers.
Vodafone Idea has also paid off bank dues pretty fast. The telco has been looking for a fresh loan from the banks and other bodies to meet its fundraising target of Rs 25,000 crore through debt.
