PLDT sees sustained growth in mobile data revenues

MANILA, Philippines - Dominant carrier Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) is confident it would be able to sustain the strong growth in mobile data revenues amid the continued growth in mobile Internet usage in the country.

PLDT president and chief executive officer Napoleon Nazareno said there is big potential for growth in the mobile data space, as not all Filipinos who owned smartphones in 2013 had data subscriptions.

 â€œThere is a strong need to democratize mobile data usage, and we are serving this need by offering affordable data sachets that allow subscribers to pay only for the data required to access specific internet services that are relevant to them,” Nazareno said.

Latest data showed that mobile data revenues of Smart Communications Inc. and Digitel Mobile Philippines Inc. jumped 59 percent to P5 billion last year from P3.1 billion in 2012.

“Because our market is predominantly prepaid, we are focusing on unlocking broadband potential at the prepaid level. We are optimistic that the affordable and relevant packages offered through PowerApp will spur data consumption among our prepaid subscribers and contribute significantly to our goal of making mobile internet accessible to more Filipinos,” he added.

Orlando Vea, chief wireless advisor of Smart and president and chief executive officer of DMPI which operates the mobile brand Sun Cellular, said the PLDT Group expects sustained mobile Internet uptake in the coming months with the entry of more affordable smartphones and the introduction of low-denomination data packages.

“We believe that we have only scratched the surface when it comes to data – smartphone penetration is at 15 percent and this can only grow further with the wide range of handset models projected to enter the market this year,” Vea said.

Smart launched in beta the PowerApp mobile application last December which lets users avail of Photo, Social, Chat, Email, and Unli mobile data packages for as low as P5.

Smart and Talk ‘N Text subscribers can download the app via Google Play and register for the Free Social Package – originally priced at P20 for one day or P10 for three hours – to get free access to the apps and mobile sites of Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Google Plus, LinkedIn, Path and Waze until March 31.