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The loan will help to rebalance Proximus’ capital structure and free up cash to be invested in fibre infrastructure
Belgian operator, Proximus, has secured a €400 million loan from the European Investment Bank, to help the company accelerate its fibre to the home (FTTH) and fibre to the premises (FTTP) initiatives.
“Through the EIB loan, we have gained a cost-effective long-term, reliable financing partner for one of our most important strategic projects,” said Proximus’ CEO Dominique Leroy.
Proximus has set itself the target of connecting 85 per cent of businesses in Belgium to full fibre networks within the next 10 years, as part of its Fibre for Belgium initiative.
The loan will provide upfront capital to help kickstart the project.
“The cooperation with the EIB will help to optimise our capital structure by lengthening the average duration of our debt portfolio as well as further diversifying our funding sources at attractive interest rates,” Proximus’ CFO Sandrine Dufour.
Currently Belgium has relatively low FTTH and FTTP penetration levels, failing to make the FTTH’s annual list of nations that have achieved at least 1 per cent penetration. The loan is expected to help Belgium change this and start to move up the FTTH ranking tables.
Proximus’ chief technology officer, Geert Standaert, will be speaking about the importance of fibre networks at this year’s Gigabit Access event in Brussels. Click here for a full agenda and to find out how you can be part of the con
