MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - AT&T Inc (N:T) plans to invest around $3 billion in its high-speed mobile Internet network in Mexico, the company said on Thursday.
AT&T, which owns Mexico's No. 3 and No. 4 wireless carriers Iusacell and Nextel, said in a statement it expects to cover 40 million people, about one-third of the population, within six months. It aims to reach 100 million by end-2018.
The company's move into Mexico came in the wake of a sweeping sector overhaul which forced billionaire Carlos Slim's America Movil (MX:AMXL) to open up infrastructure and let rivals interconnect to his network for free.
The company's Mexico chief executive, Thaddeus Arroyo, said in May that it will take a couple of years to get the business where the company wants.
A major part of the reform was a plan to tender the building of a wholesale mobile broadband network that will require an investment of around $7 billion.
The network will need at least some operators to become clients in order to attract investors, the minister in charge of the project said in May.