[Kabar-indonesia] Telkom aims for 33m subscribers by end '06 [+Poor nations to fuel growth]

[JoyoNews at aol.com]

also: Future mobile telephone growth to come from poorer countries

Telkomsel CEO aims for 33 mln subscribers by end '06

SINGAPORE, June 20 (Reuters) - Indonesia's largest mobile phone
operator, PT Telekomunikasi Selular (Telkomsel), said on Tuesday it is
aiming for a total of 32 to 33 million subscribers by the end of 2006.

Telkomsel Chief Executive Kiskenda Suriahardja told reporters on the
sidelines of a telecoms conference in Singapore that the company wants
to add about eight million new subscribers by the end of this year, up
from 24.3 million last year.

As at the end of May, the operator had 28.1 million subscribers.

Telkomsel is 65 percent-controlled by Indonesia's largest telecoms
firm, PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia Tbk , with the remaining 35 percent
stake owned by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd. , Asia's
fifth-largest phone company.

The number of mobile phone users is expected to grow strongly this
year in Indonesia, home to 220 million people, after expanding by 50
percent in 2005.

Many experts in the industry predict the number of mobile phone
customers will hit 100 million by 2010.

Despite the strong growth, the penetration rate in the world's fourth
most populous nation is still low at around 20 percent, compared with
Malaysia, where around two-thirds of the population have a mobile
phone, and Thailand, where the figure is roughly 50 percent.

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Future mobile telephone growth to come from poorer countries

SINGAPORE, June 20 (AFP) -- Future expansion in the mobile telephone
business will come from developing economies whose less than affluent
consumers cannot be overlooked while overall growth slows, experts
said Tuesday.

Income levels of consumers in the world's poorer nations may not come
anywhere near their wealthy counterparts but they offer far better
growth prospects for the sector as a whole, telecommunications
executives said at CommunicAsia2006, a major four-day exhibition and
associated conferences which opened Tuesday.

"Growth in the mobile industry isn't going to be coming from the guys
in the crowd here wearing coats and ties," said Andrew Buay, chief
operating adviser of Globe Telecom, a telecommunications operator from
the Philippines.

"If you just think of where the next billionth (subscriber is) ...
coming from, they are going to be coming from countries with GDP
(gross domestic product) of less than 1,000 US dollars (per capita),"
he said.

Industry research estimates there are 2.2 billion mobile subscribers
globally, a figure expected to rise to three billion by the end of
2008.

Asian countries that fall into the high growth category include
Pakistan, Indonesia, China, India and the Philippines, where rural
areas remain largely untapped, industry players said.

"Pakistan is one of the fastest growing markets. It's a huge market,"
said Mubashir Naqvi, vice president for commercial operations at
Ufone, a telecom operator which began service in 2001.

Naqvi said an estimated 95.5 million potential consumers in Pakistan
remain untapped despite the presence of six mobile operators in the
country.

Globe Telecom's success in the Philippines, where it is one of the
leading mobile providers, demonstrated clearly there are opportunities
in the developing markets with average revenue per user (ARPU) of five
to six US dollars, Buay said.

"We have to just take the example of the Philippines ... we have one
of the highest operating margins of operators in the world and that is
on the five-to-six US dollars ARPU customers.

"It doesn't mean a low-income, low-ARPU customer is any less profitable."

At the same time, the take-up of more advanced services and products,
including third-generation (3G) technology promising faster speeds and
better video images, has generally been below expectations in
developed as well as under-developed countries.

Industry players risk missing out on growth opportunities in
less-developed markets if they continue to hope the developed markets
will warm to the roll-out of more advanced mobile services, Buay said.

"I think if we just keep on talking about growth for high-end 3G
mobile broadband and so forth, then I think we are missing the point,"
Buay said.

"We are going to miss the next billionth mobile subscriber," he said,
adding a change of mindset is needed if the industry hopes to be
successful in developing markets.

"We have to think that innovation isn't just the domain for the high
ARPU customers," he said, urging the industry to think of applications
and services that can take account of the cash flow constraints of low
income subscribers.

Jonathan Auerbach, a senior executive from management consulting firm
McKinsey and Company, said it remains to be seen which new
applications and services will win mass acceptance and become a new
cash driver for the mobile sector.

"Across the board in wireless globally, growth rates are slowing," he
said. bh/it/lh

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Joyo Indonesia News Service
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