Telus said its capital expenditures (Capex) decreased 1.8 percent to $756 million in Q2 2020 due to the timing of its fibre build activities.
Telus said it increased investments in 5G network and made investments to enhance systems reliability during the Covid-19 pandemic.

“In June, we announced 5G network roll-out in Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary, Edmonton, and the Greater Toronto Area, with expansion to an additional 26 markets across in remainder of the year,” Darren Entwistle, president and CEO of Telus, said.

Capital expenditures included advancing wireless speeds and coverage, supporting systems reliability and operational efficiency and effectiveness efforts, and the addition of homes and businesses directly to fibre-optic technology.

Telus PureFibre network covered approximately 2.33 million premises, or approximately 73 percent of high-speed broadband footprint, reflecting an increase of approximately 290,000 fibre premises over the last twelve months.

Telus is aiming to make capital investments of $2.75 billion in 2020. It will not slash its Capex for the year.

Telus added 151,000 new wireless, internet, TV and security customers, down 55,000 over the same quarter a year ago. It added 141,000 residential voice customers including 61,000 mobile phones, 33,000 mobile connected devices, as well as 37,000 internet, 8,000 TV and 12,000 security customers.

Total wireless subscriber base rose 4.9 percent over the last twelve months to more than 10 million, reflecting 2.4 percent increase in mobile phones subscriber base to 8.8 million and 21 percent increase in mobile connected devices subscriber base to over 1.6 million.

Internet connections grew 6.4 percent over the last twelve months to 2 million customers. TV subscriber base rose 4.4 percent to 1.2 million. Telus said security customer base expanded to 635,000.

Telus won US-based Ookla’s 2020 Speedtest Fastest Mobile Award – marking the sixth consecutive year that Telus has won this award – as well as the 2020 Best Mobile Coverage Award for the third time.

UK-based Opensignal found Telus network is better and faster than in any location within G7 nations, with the exception of Japan, a significantly smaller country than Canada, which at 49 Mbps was only slightly faster than Telus’ 48 Mbps.

Telus said its operating revenue increased 3.6 percent to $3.7 billion in the second quarter of 2020.