TM Submits Plan to KKMM and MCMC

On the back of the successful upgrade of 973,000 unifi customers to higher speeds, Telekom Malaysia Berhad (TM) today submitted a plan to the Ministry of Communications and Multimedia (KKMM) and Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) to address the remaining 934,000 Streamyx and unifi customers to further increase the overall coverage and internet quality of the nation.

The announcement of the plan was made by Tuan Haji Rosli Man, Chairman of TM Group, at the press conference in conjunction with Kembara Digital Malaysia held in Ipoh. Also present at the event were YB Gobind Singh Deo, Minister of Communications and Multimedia; Dato’ Suriani Dato’ Ahmad, Secretary General of KKMM; Tuan Al-Ishsal Ishak, Chairman of MCMC; Dato’ Noor Kamarul Anuar Nuruddin, Group Chief Executive Officer, TM; and Imri Mokhtar, Chief Operating Officer, TM.

TM intends to also seek support from Government of Malaysia for this implementation utilising existing funding to deliver better broadband services to rural and sub-urban areas, in line with the National Fiberisation and Connectivity Plan (NFCP).

TM will be addressing the copper network challenges via various technologies such as fibre, wireless and GigaWire in a network rollout which will involve a phased customer migration starting today until 2021. It is expected that 70% of these customers will be able to enjoy unifi services by end 2020.

TM also announced a new entry level broadband package of up to 8Mbps at RM89 a month for residential customers. Meanwhile, existing Streamyx residential customers will enjoy this offer at RM69 a month. In addition, a wireless broadband alternative will be launched to address the issues faced by Streamyx customers today; while the network is being rolled out until 2021. Details will be announced very soon under its #khabarbaik programme.

Tuan Haji Rosli said, “We are committed to resolve the Streamyx issues and believe that the plan is the way forward to address not only the limitation of the copper broadband network, but also to lay the foundation for a better internet experience for all existing and future customers nationwide. We look forward to a collaborative approach, working closely with the Government, Ministry and MCMC to effectively deliver high speed broadband experience towards realising Malaysia’s Digital Nation aspirations.”

TM completed its internet upgrade programme in April 2019 with 973,000 unifi customers upgraded to 10 times the existing speed; 266,000 Streamyx customers in unifi coverage areas upgraded to unifi and 226,000 Streamyx customers in non-unifi coverage areas upgraded to 2 times existing speed where technology permits. This exercise has helped to uplift Malaysia’s position in global high speed connectivity rankings. In February 2019, the Speedtest Global Index by Ookla reported that fixed broadband download speeds in Malaysia increased by almost threefold to 70.18Mbps as compared to 22.26Mbps a year ago. Malaysia is now ranked 28th in the world as compared with 56th in 2017. Further, the MCMC has also reported that the number of fixed broadband subscriptions with download speeds of more than 100Mbps have risen tremendously from 150,000 in 2017 to 1.2 million subscribers in 2018.