Bell Canada last week announced that it will rapidly expand its broadband fibre and wireless networks with a $1 billion to $1.2 billion acceleration in capital expenditures over the next 2 years.
This investment acceleration is in addition to Bell's typical annual capital expenditures of approximately $4 billion over the last decade (which grew to $4.2 billion in 2020 due to investment in network capacity and digital platforms in response to unprecedented usage demand during COVID-19).
Funded from the proceeds of Bell's sale of data centres in 2020, the additional $1 billion to $1.2 billion investment is expected to generate an estimated $2 billion in new economic activity and create approximately 5,300 additional direct and indirect Canadian jobs. The program will also leverage accelerated expensing of capex under the federal capital cost allowance program, generating cash tax savings that can be reinvested in infrastructure development.
Bell expects to invest approximately $700 million of this additional capital in 2021 to accelerate both our wireless and wireline network footprints. This includes an incremental increase of up to 400,000 more homes and business covered by fast fibre and rural Wireless Home Internet service (which will increase new locations covered this year to as many as 900,000, for a total broadband footprint of approximately 6.9 million locations by the end of 2021).
At the same time, Bell plans to double the national population coverage of Bell 5G, the fastest wireless network in the country, which currently serves more than 150 communities across Canada.
Mirko Bibic, President and CEO of BCE Inc. and Bell Canada
Bell has offered critical support to Canadians throughout COVID-19, and we are proud to ensure our networks will play a key role in the country's move forward as we announce our plan to accelerate the rollout of Bell network connections to hundreds of thousands of additional locations in urban and rural communities alike this year.
