Five telcos sign share subscription agreement with DNB

 

Five mobile network operators signed a share subscription agreement (SSA) to hold equities in Digital Nasional Berhad (DNB) today.

They are CelcomDigi Berhad (CelcomDigi) through Infranation Sdn Bhd, Maxis Broadband Sdn Bhd (Maxis), U Mobile Sdn Bhd (U Mobile), Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) and YTL Power International Bhd (YTL).

Communications and Digital Minister Fahmi Fadzil said the next step after the signing of the SSA is for these companies to help DNB complete the 5G implementation process to reach 80 percent coverage.

“As of Oct 31, we have achieved 73 percent coverage of populated areas, and there is another seven percent to go to reach 80 percent.

“This figure is important because after we have hit 80 percent, the government will announce that a new entity can be created with several operators remaining with DNB as entity A while several other operators will begin operations and develop the second 5G network under entity B,” he told a media conference today.

The government had earlier targeted an 80 percent coverage of populated areas for the 5G network by the end of this year.

Fahmi also gave an assurance that the 5G service being used by the people would not be disrupted both throughout the process of completing the 80 percent coverage and when entity B is established and the second network is developed.

He said all mobile network operators had agreed that the wholesale price for 5G would not increase when the second network is launched.

“On the part of the ministry and the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission, we will continue to monitor the implementation to ensure no problems will arise.

“The Special Committee set up on May 9 this year for 5G implementation will also monitor and invite all parties for discussions to ensure that in terms of implementation, there will be no problems that cannot be resolved together,” he added.

Apart from this, Fahmi said the 5G adoption rate in Malaysia was 10.8 percent as of the end of October this year.

Shareholdings

Meanwhile, DNB said in a statement that the signing of the SSA, which is subject to due diligence, would enable operators to own 70 percent of shareholdings in DNB collectively or 14 percent shareholdings individually.

It said the government, through the Minister of Finance Incorporated, would hold the remaining 30 percent equities in DNB and Special Share.

“Every operator which signed this SSA will inject RM233 million into DNB, which will be used to meet the financing needs for implementing the 5G network in Malaysia,” the statement said.

It added that the inking of the SSA marked an important achievement by the Malaysia 5G Dual Network Implementation Task Force, which consists of members from the Finance Ministry, Communications and Digital Ministry, MCMC, DNB and mobile network operators.

As of the end of last October, there were 3.6 million subscribers to the 5G service in the country, DNB said.

- Bernama