Myanmar's government plans to increase the percentage of mobile phone users to 80 percent by 2015, according to a message President Thein Sein sent to parliament on July 8.
“Currently, only 7.08 percent of the
Myanmar's 60 million population have access to mobile phones. Therefore,
we are implementing a plan to increase the telephone density to 22.8
percent in the fiscal year 2013-14, 50 percent in 2014-15, and between
75 and 80 percent in 2015-16,” the President’s message read.
On June 27, Norway's Telenor and Qatar's
Ooredoo became the first foreign companies to be granted mobile
operating licenses in Myanmar, one of the world’s last telecom
frontiers.
They defeated nine other finalists in a
competitive government bid, including Singapore Telecommunications,
India’s Bharti Airtel, Japan’s KDDI, Vietnam's Viettel, and Caribbean
provider Digicel.
The 15-year license winners are required to provide voice services across 75 percent of the country and data services across 50 percent of the country within five years. Myanmar currently lacks basic telecom infrastructure to support a nation-wide coverage.
Deputy Minister for Communications and
Information, Thaung Tin has said that the two licence holders must pay a
compensation of US$ 200 million should they fail to live up to their
initial investment promises.
"They will have to put down US$ 200
million, this is called a 'performance bond' and we will only issue the
licenses after that amount has been paid. If they fail to live up to
what they said, we will deduct penalty from US$ 200 million,” said the
Deputy Minister at a press conference on Wednesday.
A joint venture of France Telecom and
Japan's Marubeni Communications has been named as reserve company should
the selected companies fail to meet the targets.
Meanwhile, a Telecommunications Bill
aimed at defining and regulating the telecom sector, is still going
through parliament in Nay Pyi Taw. It is expected to be signed into law
in coming months.
Norwegian State-controlled Telenor,
which has 150 million customers worldwide, said it would possibly launch
the networks next year and achieve the nationwide coverage within five
years.
Qatari Ooredoo has promised to invest a
total of US$15 billion in Myanmar, which will become its second largest
market next to Indonesia.
Both companies will also be competing with two government-owned telecom entities who currently dominate the mobile market.
source: Eleven Myanmar
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