Broadcast company GMA Network Inc. said it will spend P800 million this year to finance the initial rollout of its digital terrestrial television service and program rights acquisition.
“The capital expenditures that have been approved related to the initial tranche of DTT transmission and back-end facilities is roughly in the vicinity of about P400 million,” GMA president Gilberto Duavit said.
“The maintenance capex is very minimal so we do not see a dramatic increase in capital spending,” he said. The company spent P1.14 billion last year.
GMA chairman and chief executive Felipe Gozon said the DTT service would be initially available in Mega Manila, Cebu and Davao by the first half of 2017.
The device can enable digital broadcast services on analog TV while transforming the unit into a smart TV capable of playing on-demand content and running different applications.
Gozon said the company planned to offer at least four digital TV channels.
GMA earlier posted a net income of P842 million in the first quarter, down by 17 percent from last year’s P1.01 billon.
The network’s revenues also increased 15 percent to P3.76 billion from P3.26 billion in the same period last year. Including political advertisements, GMA’s revenues fell 4 percent in the first quarter from a year ago.
Political ads contributed P640 million to the company’s top time in the first quarter of 2016 in the runup to the presidential elections.