Tot Spending Bt3 Bn On More 3g Cell Sites

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TOT spending Bt3 bn on more 3G cell sites

By USANEE MONGKOLPORN

THE NATION

Published on November 16, 2009

TOT plans to spend about Bt3 billion on installing an additional 200 indoor cell sites and an undisclosed number of outdoor sites for its existing 3G network in greater Bangkok, in order to better serve prospective customers.

The investment plan will be proposed for the board's consideration soon, said TOT senior executive vice president Wichien Naksrinual.

TOT will launch 3G wireless broadband service on its 3G network on December 3. It spent Bt1.7 billion on upgrading the network from 2G to 3G technology.

The network currently has the capacity to serve 500,000 subscribers.

The state agency will lease part of its 3G network on a wholesale basis to five companies - 365 Communication, Loxley, Samart, IEC and M Consultant - to provide the 3G service on the mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) basis.

An MVNO is a company without its own network and which must therefore lease a network and airtime from another party.

TOT's minimum wholesale network-leasing price is about Bt300 per month per user.

Wichien said the state agency would allocate an initial batch of 20,000 mobile-phone numbers to each of the five MVNOs for provision of the service.

TOT earlier said it had planned to assign 100,000 numbers to each of them, but it has since changed its mind as it now intends to provide the 3G service on 100,000 numbers by itself.

While the MVNOs will target students and household users, TOT will tap corporate customers, as well as selling 3G SIM cards to its roughly 20,000 employees from November 19-23.

TOT expects the network to sign up 500,000 subscribers within six months, which will boost its 3G service revenue to at least Bt150 million per month.

It will give away 3G phones costing about Bt4,000 to around 10,000 current customers of its mobile-phone operator subsidiary, Thai Mobile.

Thai Mobile had provided the 2G service on TOT's network in greater Bangkok, before TOT upgraded the network to 3G technology. It will switch Thai Mobile customers to the 3G service.

Those using TOT's 3G network will be able to roam with the network of Advanced Info Service for voice service while in the provinces. TOT entered into a roaming deal with AIS many years ago for Thai Mobile, which has paid a roaming fee of 42 satang per minute per customer to AIS.

TOT also plans to roll out a new nationwide 3G network at a cost of about Bt20 billion, 80 per cent of which will be financed by foreign loans, according to the plan. The network will have the capacity to serve 5 million subscribers.

Samart Corp, Jasmine International and Loxley are interested in forming a consortium with foreign telecom suppliers to bid to supply the new 3G network to TOT.

Nokia-Siemens, Hauwei Technologies and Alcatel are reportedly courting Samart to be its partner in the bidding.

TOT will hold a public hearing on the terms of reference for 3G network procurement in January.

It will seek permission from its 100-per-cent shareholder, the Finance Ministry, to procure the network via the traditional bidding process, as an electronic auction takes too long.

TOT expects to announce the bid winner next April.

Wichien said TOT would also revise the planned number of base stations for the new 3G network, in line with its present budget.

It had originally set aside Bt29 billion for setting up 3,800 base stations, but the Information and Communications Technology Ministry slashed the budget to Bt20 billion.

TOT has yet to make a final decision on whether to use foreign loans or telecom-equipment suppliers' credit for the network roll-out. This is dependent on which option offers the better financial terms.

Last Wednesday, TOT president Varut Suvakorn said that if the Finance Ministry agreed to guarantee the borrowing for the project, TOT could obtain low-interest loans that would enable it to break even within five to eight years.

-- The Nation 2009/11/16

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