Afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. This is Dovan, the moderator for your conference call. Welcome to the Vodafone Idea Limited Q4 FY2025 earnings call. For the duration of this presentation, all participants' lines will be in the listen-only mode. After the presentation, a question-and-answer session will be conducted. Should you need assistance during the call, please signal an operator by pressing star and then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. We have with us today Mr. Akshaya Moondra, CEO of Vodafone Idea Limited, and Mr. GVAS Murthy, CFO of Vodafone Idea Limited, along with other key members of the senior management on this call. I want to thank the members of the management team on behalf of all participants for taking valuable time to be with us.
Given that the senior management is on this conference call, participants are requested to focus on key strategic and important questions to make sure that we make good use of the senior management's time. I must remind you that the discussion on today's call may include certain forward-looking statements and must be viewed, therefore, in conjunction with the risk that the company faces. With this, I now hand the conference call over to Mr. Akshaya Moondra. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Dovan. A warm welcome to all participants to this earnings call. On Friday, our Board of Directors adopted the audited results for the quarter and year ending March 31, 2025. All the results-related documents are available on our website, and I hope you had a chance to go through the same. Let me provide key highlights for the quarter, progress on our investments, and its positive impact, along with the updates on our key strategic initiatives. Post this, I will hand over to Murthy to share details on the company's financial performance. Before I move on to company-specific performance, let me share some thoughts on Indian telecom markets and growth opportunities. Wireless connectivity has become the backbone of India's digital ecosystem, connecting over a billion people across diverse geographies.
Telecom companies have made substantial investments in wireless infrastructure, providing extensive 4G coverage covering almost 99% of the population and rolling out 5G networks considered among the fastest in the world. The criticality of having a robust wireless sector has been authenticated multiple times, including during the COVID-19 pandemic, which enabled remote working, digital education, telemedicine, and e-commerce, keeping the economy and essential services functioning. In times of geopolitical tension or natural disasters, the wireless network ensures real-time communication, coordination, and crisis response. All this reinforces that India is among the top nations that offer such deep population coverage.
Over the last decade, the wireless operators have made very large investments in acquiring spectrum and expansion of network infrastructure, be it 4G to address the growing customer demand or rolling out advanced technology like 5G, where the customer demand is still evolving, to support the Digital India vision of our honorable Prime Minister. However, the sector faces significant challenges. India has one of the lowest RPUs in the world, making it challenging for telcos to sustain investment and innovation. The private mobile operators hiked tariffs in July 2024 after more than two years since the previous price increase in November 2021, leading to improvements in RPU and revenue. However, despite the price increase, the RPU in India remains one of the lowest globally, and the industry's ROC continues to remain below cost of capital.
Further, the telecom sector requires significant investments to support emerging technologies and meet the rapid increase in data consumption. These investment needs are further accelerated by rapid AI advancements. Therefore, to ensure a fair return on significant investments and support future capital expenditure in the telecom industry, further tariff increases are essential. Additionally, the industry needs to move towards a pricing model where heavy data users contribute more proportionally to their higher usage than the current pricing structure where incremental data usage comes at an extremely low, unsustainable price. Over the last few quarters, the industry had made extensive investments in establishing, maintaining, and upgrading infrastructure. On the back of these investments, India has significantly improved its global ranking in mobile broadband speed from 118th to 15th in a report published by the Portulans Institute, an independent nonprofit research and educational institute based in Washington, D.C.
The surge in connectivity demands across all demographics, driven by diverse income groups, age segments, and evolving customer behavior, has also boosted India's ranking in the Network Readiness Index 2024 to 49th position, up from 60th in the same report. However, despite this impressive growth, overall broadband penetration still remains below 65%, representing a significant opportunity for further growth with higher adoption of broadband services. Let me now give an update on our engagement with DOT. In December 2024, the Department of Telecommunications extended its support to the telecom industry by dispensing with the requirement of bank guarantees to be submitted for spectrum auctions held prior to the 2021 reform package, with certain conditions. We continued our engagement with DOT and requested the DOT for conversion of spectrum auction dues of INR 369.5 billion into equity shares in line with the reforms package of 2021.
The DOT accepted our request, and the board of the company took the necessary steps and issued 36.95 billion equity shares at an issue price of INR 10 each on April 8, 2025. With this, the government shareholding increased from 22.6%- 49%. The promoter shareholding now stands at 25.6%. The promoters continue to have operational control of the company. On the topic of fundraise, during the quarter, besides the conversion of government dues, the company also allotted about 1.7 billion equity shares at an issue price of INR 11.28 per share, including a premium of INR 1.28 per share for an aggregate consideration of INR 19.1 billion to Vodafone Group entities on a preferential basis.
Cumulatively, during the year, the company has raised equity of INR 614 billion, which comprised of FPO of INR 180 billion, preferential issue of about INR 40 billion to promoters, being Aditya Birla Group INR 21 billion, and Vodafone Group INR 19 billion, about INR 25 billion to vendors Nokia and Ericsson, and finally INR 369 billion to the Government of India. Let me now talk about our strategic initiatives. Our first strategic initiative is our focused investment approach. Our CapEx investments are continuing to gather significant momentum. Before I move to the regular update, I would like to mention that we initiated the roll out of 5G in March 2025, and as we speak, our 5G services are now available in cities of Mumbai, Delhi, Chandigarh, and Patna. Our expansion efforts are underway to offer 5G services in all the 17 circles where we have 5G spectrum by August 2025.
For Q4 FY2025, we invested INR 42.8 billion, which is the highest quarterly CAPEX since merger. This brings the total CAPEX for FY2025 to INR 96.2 billion. During the quarter, we made substantial strides in expanding our network footprint, adding over 6,900 unique broadband towers, the largest quarterly addition since our merger. We continue to strengthen our network on sub-gigahertz 900 band across all the 16 circles where we have 900 megahertz spectrum. During the quarter, we added about 18,400 sites, enhancing overall coverage and significantly improving indoor connectivity. Further, we added about 14,500 sites in the 1800 megahertz and 2100 megahertz band, primarily to boost network capacity, enabling faster data speeds on the gigahertz network. Our overall broadband site count stood at around 449,600 as of March 31, 2025, versus 430,700 as of March 31, 2024.
With our investments during the year, we have added net 14,100 broadband towers versus net cumulative addition of about 14,900 broadband towers in the last five years from FY2020 to FY2024. I'm very pleased to share that we expanded our 4G population coverage by 73 million, reaching 83% of the population, up from 77% in March 2024. During the same period, our 4G data capacity grew by around 31%, which contributed to an improvement of 28% in 4G speeds. I must remind you that this is just the start of our larger investment cycle. As mentioned earlier, we plan to take 4G tower count to approximately 215,000-220,000. That is an increase of over 45,000 4G towers versus March 2024, which will improve our 4G population coverage to around 90%.
With these initial investments, which have resulted in increased coverage and capacity, and as a result, offering better customer experience, we are witnessing a significant reduction in our subscriber loss. We are confident that these trends will improve further as the CAPEX investment continues. Further, the progressive launch of 5G services should further support the subscriber traction. This CAPEX and network expansion will enable the company to participate in the industry growth. Moving on to market initiatives, we remain dedicated to offering more than just seamless connectivity. Our focus is on enhancing our consumers' digital lifestyles through experiences that go beyond traditional voice and data services. In our postpaid segment, performance continues to improve and remains a key priority. As noted last quarter, our postpaid subscriber base has shown consistent growth both quarter on quarter and year on year.
While much of this growth stems from the end-to-end segment, we've also seen a steady rise in individual postpaid users over the past year. To cater to the diverse needs of our postpaid customers, we continue to deliver a well-curated portfolio of feature-rich plans. Last year, we introduced EasyPlus, an innovative solution for corporate postpaid users, which allows the corporate subscribers to directly purchase add-on services such as international roaming, OTT subscriptions, and data packs for personal use within their existing corporate plans, fulfilling a long-felt need of corporate customers. Available through the VAS, EasyPlus is a first-of-its-kind offering that simplifies the process of buying additional services, giving users flexibility and enhancing the overall customer experience. During the quarter, we launched the VMAX Limitless Postpaid Data Plans in nine markets, offering truly unlimited high-speed data.
These plans also include premium benefits such as exclusive access to entertainment content and other value-added services. On the prepaid front, last quarter saw the launch of two innovative plans. The SuperHero Plan, available in 12 key markets, offers unlimited data from midnight to noon, along with data of 2 GB per day. Meanwhile, the Nonstop Hero Plan, rolled out in 16 markets, provides truly unlimited data access 24 by 7. Both plans have received a positive uptick from consumers, driving growth in RPU and subscriber base across major markets. Customer RPU excluding M2M has shown a quarter-on-quarter increase of 1% despite a reduction of two days during the quarter. 4G subscribers increased from 126 million to 126.4 million during the quarter. The data traffic growth has also been by around 5.2% in Q4. We offer international roaming coverage in 198 countries.
We continue to enhance our international roaming services and expanded our roaming packs to 15 more countries in the last quarter alone. Our roaming packs are now available in 144 countries worldwide. I'm very pleased to share that we are the only operator offering unlimited data and calls in as many as 29 countries. To further enrich the travel experience, we have partnered with Blue Ribbon Bags, a US-based luggage concierge service, to offer baggage protection for our postpaid international roaming customers. Additionally, we have introduced a double data proposition with select international roaming packs, allowing customers to enjoy more data during their travels. This initiative aims to enhance the international travel experience by addressing key concerns and providing a comprehensive and worry-free international travel experience for Vi customers.
To build affinity with youth of India, we partnered with Spotify, Yuva, and Snapchat to design innovative engagements tailored to the platforms to extend the platform of these someone's feet and urge everyone to make our world a little less lonely through power of connections. Engagement spiked further with Ranmahotsav on the Vi App during IPL. We amplified impact through influencer-led campaigns and digital awareness drives across key propositions. Vi's creative edge was recognized at the FACS Awards with wins for content marketing and best use of visuals. The company is taking various initiatives to tackle the growing illness of cyber frauds. We have implemented a nationwide checking of suspicious SMSs. Currently, we are roughly blocking about 600,000 SMSs per day and also delivering about 1,800,000 SMSs per day as suspected spam messages.
We have also implemented identification of suspected spam calls in Mumbai and Delhi and are currently identifying around 12 million calls every day as suspected spam calls. We are also implementing the initiative of identifying the calling name presentation whereby the name of the calling party will be displayed with each call. In case of international calls, while the name will not be identified, the calls will be identified as international calls. All these initiatives will go a long way in safeguarding the interests of our valued customers. With a goal to focus on customer experience, we expanded our retail presence by opening more than 100 new flagship stores over the past six months. This expansion brings the total number of Vi flagship stores to over 500 nationwide, all directly operated by the company in metro and Tier 1 markets.
Additionally, our overall physical retail footprint now includes more than 2,500 Vi stores and mini stores across 600 cities and towns. While a large share of our customer concerns is resolved digitally through Vi App, we serve over 50,000 customers daily across retail touchpoints. Our stores enable us to deliver a distinct and high-quality service experience as reflected in industry-leading Google rating of 4.4 out of 5. Moving on to business services, our strength in serving the enterprise sector is built on deep, trusted relationships with our clients and the global capabilities of the Vodafone Group. We are evolving from a traditional telecom provider into a full-scale tech go, extending beyond connectivity to offer advanced solutions such as hybrid SD-WAN, SIP, IoT, industrial IoT, and cloud services.
We continue to accelerate this momentum by diversifying our portfolio and collaborating with strategic partners, ensuring our offerings remain highly relevant, future-ready, and impactful for enterprise clients. Vi Business recently signed an MOU with the West Bengal State Export Promotion Society to drive digital transformation for MSMEs in the state. As a part of the partnership, Vi Business will offer localized digital tools, training modules in Bengali, and conduct training sessions to boost technology adoption among MSMEs in West Bengal. In parallel with our efforts to digitally empower MSMEs, Vi Business also continued to strengthen its engagement with India's business leadership through the 14th edition of Vi T Walk. They even brought together over 250 CXOs and senior business leaders from diverse industries, creating a premium platform for high-value networking and engagement.
Beyond the game, V T Walk facilitated meaningful conversations and strengthened relationships in an exclusive relaxed setting, reinforcing our commitment to building lasting partnerships with the business community. Our IoT lab is emerging as a vital enabler of interoperability and standardization in the ecosystem. As the Indian telecom industry's first lab as a service offering, it has issued 24 certifications this year alone, demonstrating strong adoption and industry confidence. Now evolving into a center of excellence, the lab serves as a collaborative hub for co-innovation, where ecosystem partners work together to develop future-ready IoT use cases. V Business has recently partnered with Hewlett Packard Enterprise to deliver next-generation managed services in India. This collaboration leverages HPE Aruba networking products to offer advanced wireless LAN switching and security solutions, aiming to transform enterprise networking experiences across various sectors, including campus networks, manufacturing facilities, large corporate headquarters, and regional offices.
V Business continues to be recognized for its impactful transformation to enterprises. We were recently recognized by CIO Choice as a digital transformation enabler for large enterprises. Our Ready for Next MSME program was recognized as the digital initiative of the year in India by Asian Telecom and won the best multi-influencer D2C, B2B at the E4M Impact Digital Influencer Awards. The next strategic initiative is driving partnerships and enhancing digital revenue streams. As highlighted before, V aims to be a truly integrated digital services provider with a very clear objective of driving higher digital engagement with our consumers and driving monetization through specific streams or by participating in select digital categories. Our stated strategy around this has been to build this through strategic partnerships and bring out most of these offerings on the V App.
We offer our own OTT platform, V Movies & TV, accessible across all major operating systems on smartphones, smart TVs, laptops, PCs, and tablets. The platform provides access to content from 17 leading OTT services through a range of subscription options for both prepaid and postpaid users. Over the past year, V Movies & TV has seen strong growth in adoption and content consumption. We remain focused on scaling the platform further with a strong pipeline of new OTT partnerships and enhanced product features planned to enrich the user experience. As you would know, V App is a multi-utility app that offers not just end-to-end telco account management but also allows consumers to play over 100 games, participate in eSports tournaments, pay utility bills, shop across categories like entertainment, food, shopping, and travel, or buy almost any OTT subscription, watch over 350 TV channels, and more.
I urge you to experience the new V App and share your feedback with us. It is our constant endeavor to elevate the experience that our app offers to our consumers. We recently enabled the V App to be used for a recharge by all prepaid users, even when their daily data limit gets over, to ensure they can recharge without delay when needed. We have also enabled UPI Autopay for all our prepaid subscribers to make it convenient so that their services are not disrupted in case they miss their expiry date. Our subscribers continue to appreciate these initiatives. Growing engagement on V App is showing in the consistently improving V App ratings on Play Store. I would like to reiterate that we will continue to have a sharp and disproportionate focus to build a digital ecosystem with our partners, enabling a differentiated experience for V users.
This will help us deliver enhanced customer value as well as provide incremental monetization opportunities. Moving on to CapEx deployment plans. With the current plan, CapEx, the 4G population coverage will increase to about 84%, and 5G will be launched in all 17 circles where we have 5G spectrum. We remain actively engaged with our lenders for tying up debt funding towards the execution of our long-term network expansion plan. The recent conversion of spectrum option used into equity has supported these discussions to move forward. With that, I hand over to Moorthy, who will share the financial highlights for the quarter.
Thank you, Akshaya. A warm welcome to each of you. The revenues for the quarter and for FY2025 were INR 110.1 billion and INR 435.7 billion, respectively, growing by 3.8% on a quarter-on-quarter basis and by 2.2% on an annual basis.
Also, this is the highest daily average revenue in the last five years. The EBITDA excluding India is INR 11.6 billion for the quarter and for the financial year was INR 23.2 billion and INR 92 billion, respectively. The improvement in FY 2025 EBITDA excluding India is INR 11.6 billion over FY 2024 was 9.5%. The reported EBITDA including India is INR 11.6 billion for the quarter was INR 46.6 billion. For FY 2025, the reported EBITDA was INR 181.3 billion as compared to INR 171.7 billion in FY 2024, an improvement of INR 10.2 billion. Further, depreciation and amortization expenses and net finance costs for the quarter were INR 55.7 billion and INR 62.6 billion, respectively. Excluding the impact of India, the depreciation and amortization expenses and net finance costs for the quarter were INR 40.7 billion and INR 52.7 billion, respectively.
The finance costs for the quarter have increased in comparison to last quarter, mainly due to forex loss during the quarter and the reversal benefit of interest in the last quarter. For FY2025, the PAC loss stood at INR 273.8 billion, lower by INR 38.5 billion over FY2024. Conversion of dues into equity by the Government of India, the company has re-recognized an amount of INR 369.5 billion from its deferred payment obligation towards spectrum. This amount has been reclassified and disclosed as share application money pending allotment under other equity as of March 31, 2025. The debt from banks reduced from INR 40.4 billion in March 2024 to INR 23.3 billion in March 2025. The cash and bank balance as of March 31, 2025, stood at INR 99.3 billion. With these developments in quarter four, there was an upgrade in trade ratings assigned to long-term and short-term bank subsidies of the company.
These upgrades will support our ongoing discussions with debt funding. With this, I hand over the call back to Dovin and open the floor for questions.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touchstone telephone. If you wish to withdraw yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to please use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. We have the first question from the line of Sanjesh Jain from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good afternoon, sir. Thanks for taking my question. First, on the 4G net side, it's been more than four months, five months we have not seen material uptick in 4G.
When should the benefit of this expansion should start visible in terms of 4G addition accelerating? That's my first question.
It's hi Sanjesh Jain. Thanks for the question. I think 4G net adds we had last quarter was a nominal increase. This quarter we've added about 0.4 million 4G subscribers. I think generally the 4G subscriber trajectory would also change in line with our overall subscriber trajectory. Also, while I mean, when I talk about 4G, it includes 5G also, but the proportion of 5G devices on our network is also growing constantly. As we roll out our 5G network across different circles, that would also kind of enable us in getting more smartphones onto our network.
These are things which are trending in the right direction, especially the subscriber metrics that we have seen a significant reduction in the subscriber loss compared to last quarter and an improvement in the 4G subscriber addition. I would say that with the continuing investment and launch of 5G, we should see a further improvement going forward. Very clear. How has been the experience of earlier 5G launches in a few locations where we have done? Have you seen the trend showing that at least early signs of that? Yeah, yeah. I think in all the four cities where we have, I mean, two circles and two cities where we have launched 5G, the uptake has been very good. Traffic has quickly started moving to 5G wherever people have 5G devices or whichever subscribers have 5G devices.
I think one thing I've been very happy about is that Mumbai, Delhi, and also Chandigarh and Patna, post the launch, we've not had any complaints with reference to 5G, really speaking. Sometimes what happens is when you roll out a new technology for the first time, you'll find lots of complaints. In fact, there's been a lot of positive feedback, and we've not had anything in terms of complaints, which is technology related. Of course, complaints can come when a customer doesn't have a satisfactory experience. I would say the launch of 5G and the uptake of 5G wherever we have launched has been very good. That is also, while it is giving a good experience on the 5G, it is also releasing capacity on the 4G networks wherever it is being implemented. That is also improving the experience on the 4G itself.
It's been good in all ways.
Any 5G subscriber number which you can share? I know it's very small right now. Any 4G penetration, 5G subscriber number we can share?
I can tell you that in almost all these four cities, in all these four cities, the number of 5G subscribers who are using 5G as a percentage of people who have 5G devices is north of 60%. Which means most people who have 5G devices have started using, although, I mean, our rollout has been just one and a half months for or two and a half months for Mumbai, and other cities have been all less than a month. The uptake, given the time period which has elapsed, has been very good. Along with the number of users, a large quantum of traffic on these sites has shifted to 5G.
That's very helpful. 5G, our tariff is the same, right? It starts with the 2 GB per day plan, or we start with 1.5 GB?
We start at the INR 299 plan, and that is our introductory offer, as we had mentioned. Ultimately, we would also kind of look at addressing that, but I think since we have just launched 5G, it is the initial phase, so we kept it attractive at INR 299.
Very clear. Actually, on the CapEx side, we did around INR 9,500 crores of CapEx for FY 2025. How should we see FY 2026 CapEx? You did mention earlier in March that we are looking at a total site of 220-225. That we should be able to achieve in FY 2026?
It is like this currently, we have got CapEx under implementation. What is under implementation is in the ballpark of about INR 5,000-6,000 crores.
A large part of it would be implemented in the current quarter, and some of it may spill over to the next quarter. In terms of our next round of CAPEX, I think we have to kind of decide and firm up our plan. It also has some dependence on the funding. I guess when we come to the next quarter, we will be able to provide some guidance there. At least for this quarter and coming quarter, we are on track for kind of incurring a CAPEX of roughly around INR 6,000 crore.
That is very clear. Anything on the fundraise, any timeline we have thought, any instrument which is in our mind, anything which has firmed up?
No.
Nothing is closed as yet, but what I can tell you is that you would have seen that along with the quarterly results, we have also taken an enabling approval, which we do every year for fundraising. Our primary source of fundraising remains bank borrowing, which we are working on. I think the conversion of the government dues to equity and along with the upgrade in the credit rating, those are facilitating factors for us to take those discussions forward. Post the conversion, the engagement has been started again seriously. That is happening. Since we do not want to remain totally that everything has to come through bank funding, we have also taken that enabling approval because for items other than bank funding and NCDs, you need an enabling approval of shareholders. We are also exploring some other possibilities in terms of instruments.
The main focus remains on securing the bank funding.
That is very clear, Akshaya. Thanks for answering all those questions, and best of luck.
Thanks, Sanjesh.
Thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Vivekanand Subramaniam from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you for the opportunity. My first question is on the engagement with the government. You and one other player have been talking about changing the way customers are charged from current 1 GB quasi-unlimited packages on a daily basis to usage-linked pricing. Now, I just want to understand, is there any engagement that you are having with the government to help you arrive at this? We have been hearing about this from the industry for quite a long time, and no progress has been made despite three tariff hikes happening over the last six years.
Is there anything that you feel that the government needs to do for you to move to that path of linking the tariffs to usage? That is one. Second, on the government front itself, Deepam now has 49% shareholding. Are they interested, or is there any conversation for them to join your board? That is on the government front. The next question is on the settlement asset. Now, your notes to accounts, note number five mentions that you have postponed the receipt of the settlement asset to September 2025. Now, given that your CAPEX depends on funding, I just want to understand why you chose to postpone it instead of get Vodafone Group to clear the settlement amount on 30 June. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Vivek. Let me answer your three questions. Your first question was on tariff and our commentary on the change in the tariff structure.
Firstly, I think this has nothing to do with the government. This is, I think, to be decided by industry as to how do they want to take it forward. I think you are right that while this discussion has been happening or this commentary has been happening for some time, we have not seen this converting to reality. I guess this requires a certain action. Somebody needs to take the lead, and maybe others need to also follow. Ultimately, I think it is not for any single player to be able to make this change. It is an industry thing, which I think inherent in our commentary is that for the tariffs to increase, we believe that the entry-level tariffs are at a decent level.
They do not have room to increase very much because we have a large population who are just using it to having some minimum connectivity. As I keep on saying, we have moved from an era of zero ARPU to about INR 5,000 ARPU to now between, for a single person if he wants to use for the full month, INR 200 to you can meet all your needs at about INR 600. That has contracted. This is fundamentally that the incremental usage comes at a very low price, which is not the case. I think industry will have to find a solution to this. I do not have any concrete points at this point of time. We do believe that is the only way the ARPUs can go up. You cannot increase the price uniformly across board now.
It has to be now incremental usage, incremental payment. Of course, it has to be telescopic by nature. Your per unit of consumption will be cheaper if you are consuming more, as happens in any kind of service or commodity that you may be selling. That answers your first question. On the second point, you said that the government is 49% shareholder, which is right. I do not think there is any intent to take up any board seating. Let me just describe it like this: that this is shareholding of the government, not with an intent to have the shareholding, but this shareholding is a consequence of their trying to provide support in reducing our dues. I think their intent is not to have this holding, really, and the intent is not to have any board seat.
Based on the best of my understanding, and which is a commentary which I think has also been there from the government themselves, is that they have no intent of taking any role in the management of the company. The third question is relating to settlement assets. Firstly, I think, as has been clarified earlier also, the recovery of settlement assets is dependent on the payment by the company of the AGR dues. Really speaking, the earlier arrangement was that these had to be paid by June 2025 for this to be effective. The settlement assets is not receivable unless we ourselves pay the AGR dues. That is the first point. Having said that, we are in discussion with Vodafone Group to see what is the best way to kind of make this arrangement workable.
While we are under discussion, we have extended the date from June to September so that there is no strict deadline and we can continue with our discussions.
Okay. I have a couple of follow-ups. You have accelerated the CapEx as far as population coverage and 5G expansion is concerned. The 4G population coverage target that you had outlined, say, by March 2026, right, 1.2 billion. Are you still on course for that? I believe Sanjesh was asking you that question with respect to the tower count and network presence. Is that target still on track, or is that getting postponed due to the fundraising, the current discussions ongoing on fundraising?
Let's say it has a linkage to the CapEx, which is already under execution, we should be reaching a level of 84% of population coverage.
1.2 billion roughly translates to 90% of 4G population coverage. I believe we will move up from 84%, but to get to 90%, it has got linkage with bank funding.
I see. Okay. Thank you. I'll get back to you all the way.
Vivek, let me just tell you one thing that I think, and it is not only that we have increased the population coverage, we've also rolled out a lot of infill sites. What we are rolling out is a mix of coverage expansion and infill sites to improve the experience of the customers. Now, I would say that compared to where we were a year ago, today we've come to a point that wherever we had congestion in our network, that has been completely addressed.
Wherever our customers were, while we were providing a good experience earlier also, I think what has changed is that there were pockets where there was congestion where we could not invest earlier. We have addressed all that. Our population coverage has also grown significantly, and I think a large part of the areas which we wanted to cover is covered. Of course, 5G is also being rolled out. I would say that while getting from 84%- 90% is important, and we have to continue with our CAPEX plans, today we have come to a point where our overall offering with the completion of this 5G also in the winning circles would be at a point where it is an offering which is competitive in the market, and we can continue to invest more.
The challenges which we had earlier where we were not able to address some of the customer experience issues, they have been fully addressed. Now, it's a question of getting to a further population coverage, which, as I said, there's some linkage to funding, which we'll continue to work on.
Understood. Thank you very much, Moondra .
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Saurabh Handa from Citigroup. Please go ahead. Yeah.
Thank you for the opportunity. I had two questions. Firstly, on the AGR issue, now following this dismissal of the latest review petition, our understanding, at least as per media reports, is that the Supreme Court did observe that if you do seek any relief from the government, then they won't come in the way. Could you give some more clarity or thoughts on this? Is our understanding correct based on the press reports?
In your view, if the government does look to provide any further relief, can they just go ahead, or do they need any specific clarity from the courts?
Saurabh, thanks for your question. Given the sensitivities around the court proceedings, I am not allowed to comment on what was said, but I guess what media has reported is a factual reporting of what happened in the court. I understand, and there are, of course, transcripts and recordings available of what is the court proceeding. I believe what media has reported is a correct reflection of what happened in the court. As far as the government release is concerned, I think we are engaged with the government.
Whether what the government will do, I think I cannot comment on behalf of the government, but definitely post the judgment, we will continue with our engagement with the government to find a solution to the AGR matter. Okay. I mean, is it fair to say that in your view, the government can proceed now without it? I think the general view was that beyond what is there in the release package, if the government were to do something, then it could be against the previous court verdict. Does this now appear that it could pave the way for the government to go ahead? I mean, in your view, I know what the government eventually does is in their hands, but is that your understanding? Yeah. Our view is that the government can do.
In fact, just to put things in perspective, even when the reforms package was announced in 2021, there was some PIL which was filed in the Supreme Court. At that time also, the Supreme Court had, when their final order was given, stated to the effect that this is a policy matter which is within the purview of the government, and they would not interfere in it. In some ways, if you look at the reforms package of September 2021, the government had taken the initiative, and I see no reason why the government should be constrained in any way to offer relief, which it decides to do.
Okay. That's very fair. Thank you.
The second question was on the debt funding now, despite the spectrum conversion to equity and also these credit rating upgrades, clearly, I guess I know you started re-engaging with banks, but the debt rating isn't going through. Is it fair to assume that it's again dependent on AGR? They're still seeking relief or clarity on AGR, even though the rating agencies seem to be okay giving you investment grade?
I think what rating agency has done is somewhat different. I think one is that after the conversion, we have started re-engaging with the banks. There are some activities which we have to finish, which are currently in progress. I think we will get to, again, a point of discussion with the banks somewhere in this month on some of the prerequisites in terms of those actions and activities are completed.
Now, I think generally, our discussions with the banks showed that they needed some more clarity on AGR. Conversion, of course, has been a big step forward. I would say that the banks would want some clarity on the AGR dues. While that is happening, it is not preventing the discussions to go forward. Discussions are still continuing. Okay. Just my last question, just to clarify, the AGR outstanding right now, is that INR 703 billion? Because there were some different numbers which have been floating around, and I think you are not mentioning this in your press release anymore. Saurabh, the figures including interest on 31st March is about INR 760 billion. INR 760. I mean, let's say it is simply last year's figure + 8% interest. That is the only change which is.
Got it. Got it. Thank you very much. Thanks.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Gaurav Malhotra from Axis. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Thank you for the opportunity. Just a few questions. So actually, you mentioned that 224,000 site number. So that was a number which was there, if I'm not incorrect, in the QIT document, SPA document also. And you are at 184. So that 184 journey to 224 is premised on the bank debt funding as well? Is my understanding correct?
Yeah. The thing is, like this one is that just give me a minute. Let's say that our unique towers are already at INR 195,000, and of course, some of these are getting converted from not being broadband to broadband. When we say a figure of about INR 220,000, that is a figure of the total number of sites. Of course, in the end result, everything will be a 4G site.
There will be no difference between the unique sites and the 4G or broadband sites. Currently, there is some gap there. Ultimately, our target is to get to about 220,000 sites. In terms of that being dependent on bank funding, as I said, with our current CapEx in progress, we should get to 84% population coverage. With some more CapEx during the year independent of funding, we could still get to around 85-86%. I think to get to the entire target of 220,000, that would be requiring bank funding for sure. Just to be clear, I think that 220,000 was an end target. It need not necessarily have been done in two years. It was a little dynamic. It could have been done in two years, two and a half years also.
That was where we said that whatever we had planned for a three-year CapEx, of course, coverage was a priority, but it could have happened anywhere between two to three years' timeframe.
Understood. The next question is on your network OpEx. Obviously, your CapEx has moved up quite sharply. The sites have moved up. Your network OpEx has essentially remained flattish in the last two, three quarters. How should we sort of think about that?
Let me just give you an overall holistic view, and then Murthy can add if required. Let me put it this way that while some costs are going up, we are also very focused on managing our costs in a better manner.
What you are saying, and ultimately, that is reflected that the costs are not going up as our costs are being maintained, and they are not going up as much as they should by rolling out of new sites. We have taken a number of actions. Some of these, if I can qualitatively tell you, is that negotiation of rentals has been done over the year where they were very high. Biggest saving is coming from energy cost optimization. A lot of initiatives have been taken that we can operate on a lesser energy cost. Of course, just to be clear, if you look at a year-on-year basis, it is comparable, but on a quarter-on-quarter basis, Q4 is the best energy cost quarter. Quarter-on-quarter comparison. Year-on-year also, we've had significant savings in energy cost.
There have been activities and initiatives like we have enforced fiber management and also managed services for some of the radio networks that we had. I can tell you, particularly on fiber, it was a major, major activity whereby we enforced everything. We also had our concerns. The end result has been good on both directions. Firstly, we have actually been able to reduce costs. More importantly, the incidents that we used to have when the fiber was being managed through outsourcing was quite bad. We have been able to reduce what we call as T1 incidents compared to when it was outsourced by 75%. A significant improvement has been done both on the cost front and also operationally. We are much better off with the enforcing. That was one area.
The last area to be highlighted is that IT cost, we were continuing with many legacy contracts. We have revisited them. I think in the last year, IT costs have also come down. Probably the benefit of some of that IT cost contracts, which have been renegotiated in the second half of the year, would also spill over and give a higher benefit in the coming year. In general, we have a strong focus on managing the cost. While new rollouts are resulting in newer costs, we are trying to see how we can best manage the existing costs. Murthy, you want to add something?
Yeah. Gaurav, network costs, as you know, do not include rentals because rentals are accounted for below the EBITDA.
Therefore, from that perspective, since most of the rollout has happened largely in the last quarter, quarter and a half, next year would have some impact on the rollout on an annualized basis. At the same time, as Akshaya said, our focus would be to remain in costs as much as possible.
Understood. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Rishabh from HSBC. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks for the opportunity. Firstly, a clarification on the discussion on Vodafone Group recoverables. On the settlement, is it dependent on the payment of entire AGR dues, or will part of AGR dues payment also help us to get settlement with Vodafone Group? Secondly, what is the strategy? Sorry.
That is a very limited part of the overall AGR dues which we have to pay to be able to claim that amount, not the entire AGR dues.
Okay. Yeah.
Go ahead.
Secondly, on the launch of Nonstop Hero Plan, what is the key strategy here as it offers unlimited data, and how does it help to boost our ARPU?
Let me put it a little holistically. Nonstop Hero is a part of our strategy. As you are aware, we have been losing a number of subscribers over a fairly long period of time because we had not made investments. As we have made investments, our offering has become very competitive. As I said, we are also launching 5G now, where we will have a very, very competitive offering in the market. To leverage that, we have created a lot of capacity in the process.
The subscriber metrics are improving, but let's say we need to have an improvement which is faster than what we have seen until now. To do that, as anybody needs to do that, if you have had a significant loss of subscribers over a longer period of time, we need to have attractive propositions for our customers so as to get them back, be able to experience our network, which they've not experienced for a long period of time. I'm sure that once they experience that with some incentives for getting them back to network, they will then continue to stay. Right now, there are products which are meant for ARPU upgrade, and we have seen that both with SuperHero and Nonstop Hero. Some Nonstop Hero plans earlier were at a price point of INR 365.
Very recently, we have, in the stronger circles, also launched a Nonstop Hero at INR 398. I think in overall terms, we are currently focused on getting more and more subscribers, experience our much improved and competitive network. Once we make some progress, ultimately, we would be having pricing which is more in line with the market. These are interventions and initiatives meant to get our subscriber base moving in the right direction.
Okay. Yeah. Time is clear. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Prashant PR from Jana Small Finance Bank. Please go ahead.
Hello. Good afternoon, sir. Yeah. Please go ahead. Yeah. My question is regarding the brand recognition that the company is going, the advertisements that the company is doing.
I was just wondering whether there are any chances of we going back to the old Zuzu ads or the PUBG ads that we had. India, I believe, is a market where there is a lot of value which comes when it comes to nostalgia, right? We have seen the release of old movies which were super hits, which actually connect with the masses. The current brand management of the company, the kind of advertisements that the company is coming up with, I'm not sure whether it is connecting with the masses, right? Can you just go back to the previous ads, say, run those campaigns, ask people to come back to V, just touch the nostalgia of the people? Is there any thought that is going in that direction for the company to connect with the masses? That's my question.
So Shams, I think this is a complicated subject. I'm not an expert on the matter, but what I'm told is that old movies and reconnecting with the old brand when you're trying, when you've established a new brand, are two different things. However, I've heard you. I'll pass on your suggestions to our brand experts and let them give a thought to this.
Yeah. Thanks. Thanks a lot.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, due to time constraints, that will be the last question. I'll now hand the conference back over to Mr. Akshaya Moondra for closing comments.
Thank you, Dovin. Friends, as discussed during the call, our initial investments have led to improved coverage and enhanced customer experience, resulting in significant reduction in subscriber loss. 5G launch is also underway in key geographies. With our intensifying investments, we are confident of improving subscriber metrics going forward.
FY2026 is going to be an important year for Vi, and the company is taking critical steps towards the transformation journey. During the past year, the company has raised INR 614 billion, including FPO of INR 180 billion, preferential issue of INR 40 billion to promoters, around INR 25 billion to vendors Nokia and Ericsson, and finally INR 369 billion to the Government of India. The government has also shown their support to the industry by waiving the BG requirement for the past spectrum auctions. We are working towards tying up debt funding for the execution of our long-term network expansion plan. As I mentioned, as we have made the investments, we are also taking various actions to make our offering and proposition more attractive to our customers and prospective customers. With this, I would like to thank you for joining this call. Have a good day.
Thank you.
On behalf of Vodafone Idea Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you all for joining us. You may now disconnect your line.