MyDigital a boost to TM - AmInvest

It said TM being the owner of the nationwide High Speed Broadband fiberised network was given conditional approval alongside Microsoft, Google, and Amazon to build and manage hyper-scale data centres, as well as provide hybrid cloud services, valued between RM12 billion and RM 15 billion over the next five years.

"While this will benefit TM One's data centre operations, we expect TM to leverage its fixed play dominance provided by its national fibre-optic network and extensive partnerships to support the building of third-party data centres, thus partly alleviating high capital expenditure (capex) requirements," AmInvest said.

MyDigital initiative involves investing RM15 billion over 10 years via a wholly government-owned special purpose vehicle (SPV) called Digital Nasional, which will own, execute and manage 5G spectrum and infrastructure.

This is envisaged to allow licensed telcos equal access to the infrastructure to roll out 5G services nationwide, which is expected to begin in stages by the end of this year.

"We view this as being neutral to cellular operators who will not be burdened by the 5G capex," the investment bank said in a research note today.

Overall, it said the telecommunications company (telco) sector's results for the fourth quarter ended 2020 were generally in line with its expectations.