Indonesia’s largest mobile operator Telkomsel plans to spend almost a $1 billion to expand its networks and aims to capture half the 4G market this year.

The company will spend IDR12.9 trillion ($991 million) to add 15,000 base stations, with three-quarters of the budget to be used to continue to expand its 3G infrastructure, the Jakarta Post said. The remainder will be split between 4G and 2G networks.

Its capex/revenue ratio last year was about 20 per cent, which is fairly low by industry standards. Rival Indosat’s capex (IDR6.5-7.5 trillion for 2015) as a percentage of revenue is about 30 per cent.

Telkomsel, a subsidiary of state-owned Telkom Indonesia, has a 46 per cent share of the country’s mobile market, but just 38 per cent of 3G connections and 11 per cent of the nascent 4G market with about 150,000 connections, according to GSMA Intelligence.

The operator currently offers 4G service only in Jakarta, Bandung (West Java), Surabaya (East Java) and Medan (Sumatra).

XL Axiata, the second largest operator with a 19 per cent market share (just one point ahead of third ranked Indosat) had just 77,500 4G connections at the end of Q1. Its new president, Dian Siswarini, said recently it aims to expand that number to three million this year. It is forecasting that 4G customers will account for up to 25 per cent of its total data users in just two years.

Last year Telkomsel’s net income increased 10 per cent and revenue expanded 10.4 per cent to IDR66.2 trillion. It expects revenue to increase 7-8 per cent this year.

Its parent company’s capex budget this year is IDR23 trillion.