Ooredoo Myanmar has deployed an LTE-A upgrade across 200 townships in Myanmar, enabling the more than 15 million people covered by the system to access potential download speeds of up to 500Mbps, Total Telecom writes, citing senior Ooredoo officials. Ooredoo spend nearly USD200 million on the upgrade of its 4G network, which now covers 87% of the country’s territory, though the operator plans to increase that figure to 92% by the end of the year. Ooredoo Myanmar CEO Vikram Sinha was quoted as saying of the rollout: ‘We are proud to have delivered this upgrade to over 200 townships in such a short amount of time, making the fastest speeds available a daily reality for our customers. We have big plans for 2018 and are working hard for network upgrade.’ As previously reported by TeleGeography’s CommsUpdate, Ooredoo announced plans for the development in December last year. Sheikh Saud bin Nasser Al Thani, CEO of the cellco’s Qatari parent Ooredoo Group, added that: ‘Through our network modernisation programme, we have successfully brought 4G+ services to our customers in Myanmar, allowing individuals and business to take advantage of the host of new opportunities that faster internet can bring them.’
The development follows on the heels of Telenor Myanmar’s announcement last week that it had rolled out LTE services to seven more cities in January, bringing its total 4G footprint to more than 120 cities and townships across the country. The new cities covered by Telenor’s network are: Meiktila and Kyaukpadaung (Mandalay Region); Loikaw (Kayah State); Tachileik (Shan State); Thandwe (Rakhine State); and Pathein and Myaungmya (Ayeyarwady Region).