KUALA LUMPUR – Internet veteran Mohamed Awang Lah has called for reduced government intervention in the rollout of telecommunication services within the nation, asserting that private companies should be allowed to develop services on their own timeline instead.
Mohamed, who is the former chief executive of Malaysia’s first internet service provider, Joint Advanced Research Integrated Networking (Jaring), pointed out that it would be part of telcos’ natural progression to expand the scope of services offered to consumers.
As such, he told Scoop that it is “illogical” for the government, through its Finance Ministry-owned special purpose vehicle Digital Nasional Bhd (DNB), to attempt to dictate the rollout of network technology by mobile network operators (MNOs).
DNB, established in March 2021 under the previous Barisan Nasional administration, is currently tasked with developing and handling the roll-out of the nation’s 5G network and infrastructure.
“MNOs should be allowed to upgrade and move forward with their services from one generation to another. Why should we have a different way for 5G? Are we going to have another way for 6G?” Mohamed questioned.
“The most logical way would be to allow MNOs to compete to secure customers,” he told Scoop, acknowledging that while government intervention could help in curbing monopolies, DNB’s function should be amended to reflect a less direct role in the matter.
Insisting that telcos in the industry should move towards sharing passive infrastructures such as fibre and network towers to reduce costs, Mohamed suggested that DNB could then act as the manager of such shared infrastructures.
He explained that if three telcos were to build their own fibre network for their exclusive use as they promote the sale of their bandwidth, the cost would be three times more as the number of users in the area remains the same.
Pointing out that users are the ones who will have to bear the brunt of high costs as expenditures on basic infrastructures constitute up to 80% of service costs, Mohamed said that there should be efforts to break the “old mentality” where companies believe that the promotion of their products is strengthened through owning infrastructures.
“I want to encourage the government to step in to ensure that fibre and towers are shared among telcos. This isn’t being done now because the government is not pushing for it and it can only be done if the government takes initiative in the form of a mandate.
“But, the industry is likely to welcome the move as it will be cheaper for them,” he added, conceding that while there is currently some tower-sharing happening, it is “not enough”.
However, he also noted that some telcos might be at a disadvantage if the measure is ever implemented as they would have already spent money on their infrastructure once cheaper versions are available.
He also said that the sharing of infrastructures would aid in ensuring more widespread network coverage as telcos will be more incentivised to expand their offerings to rural areas if they can share infrastructures there.
“Currently, telcos have to cherry-pick and go to the places with more potential revenues as it’s very expensive for them to own their own tower or fibre (infrastructure) to go to rural areas.
“They’re not welfare organisations, they’re business entities which are profit-motivated. We cannot expect them to manage the rakyat’s welfare,” he said, adding that the matter can be resolved by utilising the Universal Service Provision (USP) fund to venture into rural areas.
The USP fund, which is managed by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), is aimed at bridging the digital divide by providing telecommunications and digital communications services to areas lacking telecommunications access.
As per the USP regulation, it is mandatory for telecommunications services companies recording a net profit of more than RM2 million for the year of assessment to contribute 6% of their weighted revenue to the USP fund. – December 13, 2024