Malaysian wireless operator Celcom Axiata is set to direct its attentions more towards digital services and machine-to-machine (M2M) businesses over the next five years, lessening its focus on the voice and SMS segments. According to Bernama, which cites Celcom’s chief financial officer Chari Tvt, the cellco will more keenly explore digital services such as payments, advertising and shopping, as well as mobile content and value added services (VAS). Further, the executive is also quoted as saying that Celcom plans to look to agreements with other operators in the future, with Chari noting: ‘We also intend to go into partnership with other telcos, we like to work together with them and have a revenue-sharing model.’ Such collaborations, it is understood, will see Celcom and any partner share telecommunications sites, access transmission, aggregation transmission and trunk fibre transmission. Such agreements, it is claimed, will allow the company to eliminate duplication and optimise the deployment of base stations, as well as enabling it to reduce utility bills and transmission costs.
As noted in TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, in December in January 2011 Celcom announced it had reached a network sharing agreement with rival DiGi Telecommunications, under which the duo said they hoped to save a combined MYR2.2 billion (USD678 million) over a ten-year period. According to Bernama, Celcom is now in talks with Maxis regarding the possibility of a similar agreement.