Malaysia’s U Mobile reportedly is planning an IPO to fund a MYR1.5 billion ($474 million) network expansion over the next 15 months.

CEO Wong Heang Tuck yesterday disclosed the plan for the IPO but did not give details on the timing or location. A U Mobile representative declined to comment on the plan.

The company plans to roll out 1,000 3G and 1,000 4G base stations by the end of 2015.

Heang Tuck issued a statement saying “we love being the challenger brand” and that the operator aims to aggressively expand its market share and increase revenue by 50 per cent by the end of next year.

He certainly has his work cut out for him. U Mobile is the fourth-ranked operator in the country with a 10.5 per cent market share. But with 4.5 million connections, it has less than half of third-place DiGi (which has 10.9 million). Less than 1 per cent of its customers have a 4G connection, according to GSMA Intelligence.

Celcom is the market leader with a 32 per cent share, followed closely by Maxis with 29 per cent.

U Mobile said it recently upgraded its business support systems by migrating to a new billing platform that will enable end-to-end real-time tracking and customer fulfillment.