TM still eyeing opportunities in Asia, says CEO
Posted on: June 19, 2009
By Samantha Tan Chiew Ting
Bernama – Friday, June 19
SINGAPORE, June 18 (Bernama) — Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) is still eyeing business opportunities in Asia, especially broadband, as it is a market worth investing in.
Its group chief executive officer, Datuk Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa, said TM would focus on improving operations while looking at business development.
“Once we are comfortable and has a strong and sustainable base, then we will be more aggressive looking for business opportunities,” he told Malaysian reporters at the CommunicAsia 2009 here.
Zamzamzairani said incumbent telecommunications companies (telcos) must shift to selling value-added services with the onslaught of disruptive technologies and declining revenue from traditional telecom services.
“Hence, telcos across the region, including TM, need to move up the value chain, by offering managed services, building up alliances, rebranding as information and communication technology service companies, and providing more integrated solutions,” he said.
Speaking at a chief executive officers’ perspective session, Zamzamzairani said it would be tough for the telecom sectors in many regions around the world to recover totally from the current economic slump, but that “there is much more opportunity for Asia to reach the industry’s former heights than Europe or the US”.
“This optimistic vision for Asia-Pacific is based on massive subscriber growth opportunities that still exist for fixed and mobile broadband,” he said.
He said that for the first time, TM’s fixed data revenues exceeded those from fixed voice during the first quarter of 2009, demonstrating the growing trends of both data service demand and fixed-to-mobile substitution.
“For the three months ended March 31, TM’s revenues increased five percent to RM2.11 billion.
“The revenues reflect an increase in income from rentals, an increase in income from internet and multimedia and higher income from data services,” he said.
Meanwhile, Zamzamzairani said TM was talking to contents providers to support the launch of the group’s commercial internet protocol television (IPTV) services, which were slated for the fourth quarter under the name ‘Hypp.TV’.
“We have to wait for the completion of High-Speed Broadband (HSBB) before launching the IPTV,” he said.
TM is currently in the process of building itself a RM11.3 billion HSBB network which will be rolled out in high-density areas such as the Klang Valley, Iskandar Malaysia and key industrial regions in the country.
The first two areas to receive fibre-to-the-home connections under the HSBB project will be Subang Jaya and Taman Tun Dr Ismail. — BERNAMA
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