Smart vows to keep mobile broadband service affordable

CEBU, Philippines - Taking advantage of the strong demand for broadband services in the Philippines, Smart Communications Inc. vows to continue providing Filipinos with affordable mobile broadband connectivity.

“Demand for broadband services in emerging markets continues to be stifled by high prices. In some countries, broadband pricing was double or triple the price of an equivalent service in a more developed market,” said Ovum analyst Richard Hurts.

Ovum, an Australia-based market analysis firm, recently released a survey result indicating that the Philippines, together with Malaysia, Pakistan and India, has one of the lowest broadband cost among emerging markets within the region.

“In addition, lower GDP per capita in most emerging markets means that broadband is only available to the highest socioeconomic groups," Hurst added.

Smart pioneered the country’s first bucket pricing scheme of P10 per 30 minutes of mobile surfing in 2006 and in 2010 it introduced UnliSurf prepaid schemes which are designed to cater to heavier users.

Smart is also the first to introduce the Unlimited Data Plans—the first and only mobile phone post-paid plans with unlimited Internet connectivity and free calls and texts in the Philippines.

Smart’s latest and most innovative offering to date is the volume-based ALWAYS ON prepaid packages which lets users stay connected to the Internet based on the amount of data they wish to consume. ALWAYS ON is available for as little as P20 for 25MB of data (valid for 1 day) or at P995 for 2GB of data (valid for 30 days).

In 2008, Smart’s wholly owned subsidiary, Smart Broadband Inc. (Smart Bro), revolutionized mobile Internet in the Philippines as it introduced the popular Smart Bro Plug-It dongle which allowed users to log on to the web wherever they please on virtually any device with a USB port.

Earlier this year, Smart Bro has further diversified and reduced the prices of its Plug-It offerings with the introduction of the High Speed Packet Access (HSPA) Smart Bro Starter Plug-It (P995 with speeds of up to 3.6Mbps) and Smart Bro Power Plug-It (P1,245 with speeds of up to 5Mbps), and the Evolved High Speed Packet Access (HSPA+) Smart Bro Rocket Plug-It (P3,995 with speeds of up to 12Mbps).

“We have always thought of ways to make it easier for Filipinos to enjoy the power of the Internet” said Smart Broadband Internet and Data Services Head Giovanni Bacareza.

“Just look back at how we’ve consistently lowered prices and how we continue to diversify our product and service lineup,” added Bacareza.

Apart from consistently lowering access costs, Smart and its parent company, the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) are currently investing a total of P67.1 billion to improve its network. These improvements include the installation and the upgrading of fiber optic cables, wireless base stations, and international gateways which, will ultimately translate to faster connection speeds.  (FREEMAN)