NTT DOCOMO is maintaining a high level of capital expenditure as it strengthens its mobile network and prepares infrastructure for AI, 5G Advanced and eventually 6G.
The operator is forecasting capital expenditure of ¥857 billion for FY2026, broadly unchanged from ¥857.5 billion in FY2025. FY2025 Capex had increased 20 percent, or ¥143.2 billion, from ¥714.3 billion in FY2024.
The investment program is heavily focused on mobile network capacity and quality. NTT DOCOMO’s FY2026 investment plan describes spending in its Integrated ICT Business — which includes DOCOMO — as targeting the expansion and improvement of mobile communications equipment and data transmission infrastructure, alongside maintenance and upgrades of voice communications equipment. The Integrated ICT Business segment itself has a planned ¥857 billion of capital investment.
5G network expansion and modernization remain major investment priorities. DOCOMO is increasing processing capacity to cope with rising mobile data traffic while deploying more advanced radio and network computing infrastructure. This includes Ericsson’s next-generation RAN Compute platform, whose deployment began in July 2026, and follows the commercial deployment of Ericsson’s 4.5GHz Massive MIMO AIR 3255 radio beginning in December 2025.
Another important focus is AI-driven network automation. DOCOMO has begun commercial deployment of agentic AI for network maintenance and is introducing AI-based network optimization technologies. The operator is also exploring AI applications running over virtualized RAN infrastructure, making AI increasingly part of both network operations and future RAN architecture.
Investment is moving toward cloud-native 5G infrastructure. DOCOMO and NEC launched Japan’s first 5G Core on AWS in 2026, incorporating AI-based automation for network construction. DOCOMO is simultaneously developing technologies that connect its commercial 5G network with distributed GPU resources through the IOWN All-Photonics Network, supporting low-latency AI inference at the network edge.
Looking ahead, 6G, AI-RAN and AIOWN are becoming strategic investment areas. NTT’s infrastructure strategy calls for transitioning connectivity infrastructure toward AIOWN, an AI-native architecture optimized across GPUs, networks and power resources. The objective is to accommodate machine-to-machine, AI-to-AI and robot-to-robot communications as AI inference traffic expands.
Overall, DOCOMO’s ¥857 billion FY2026 Capex plan represents a largely stable investment level following the 20 percent surge in FY2025, but the composition is increasingly oriented toward 5G capacity, RAN modernization, AI-native networking, automation, cloud-native 5G Core, GPU-connected edge infrastructure, energy efficiency, AI-RAN and 6G technologies.
BABURAJAN KIZHAKEDATH
