Fitch: 5G rollout in Philippines to be ‘limited’
by Lisbet K. Esmael, The Manila Times
Despite the publicized efforts of telecommunications companies (telcos) to roll out services powered by “5G” technology in the Philippines, Fitch Ratings presented a bleak outlook for its initial adoption.
In a report published on Tuesday night July 30th, the global debt watcher said 5G reach in the country remained “uncertain,” and expected its rollout “to be limited this year, considering the early stage of adoption and deployment, particularly in a predominantly prepaid market like the Philippines.”
Such adoption, Fitch Ratings said, may lie in the affordability and availability of devices, which should be 5G-ready.
“Prices of 5G customer-premises equipment would need to fall considerably for mass-market adoption to take place in emerging markets,” Fitch added.
“The Philippine government has also not formally identified the 5G spectrum band for telcos,” Fitch Ratings noted.
The report comes after one of the country’s leading telcos, Ayala-led Globe Telecom Inc. recently introduced “5G” powered fixed wireless services (not standardized by anyone), mainly to its home subscribers.
It made these services commercially available on Saturday in Buting village in Pasig City, offering speeds of up to 100 megabits per second and data capacity of up to 2 terabytes.
Globe Telecom aims to also offer these services in two dozen more areas, including Greenpark in Cainta town, Rizal province; Woodland Hills in Carmona town, Cavite province; and Carissa Homes 2A and 2B, Palmera Homes in San Jose del Monte City, Bulacan province.
Another telco, PLDT Inc., is poised to introduce its own 5G services by early 2020, delaying its supposed fourth-quarter launch, as it is yet to identify its technology vendor.
New telco players Dito Telecommunity Corp. (formerly Mislatel Consortium) — selected by the government in November to challenge the dominance of the so-called PLDT-Globe duopoly — and NOW Telecom are also looking to launch their 5G services soon.
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- We expect over 4bn 5G subscribers in 2028, while (pre-standard) 5G services will be available in 25 countries by the end of 2019.
- 4G will remain a key technology worldwide in the 2020s.
- IoT and industry remain the key use case in our view.
- Business users will be the key clients of 5G services, as part of the digital transformation trend.
–>US, China, South Korea And Japan Key Early Adopters
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References:
Philippines’ Globe Telecom to deploy “Air Fiber 5G” this month
“5G” Fixed Wireless Technology to be Deployed in Philippines by Globe Telecom in 2Q 2019
3 thoughts on “Fitch: 5G rollout in Philippines to be ‘limited’”
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If 5G is a standard; all phones should work. What do travelers do ?
Makes no sense to have bought a 1,000.00 USD phone and travel to USA , ME , Europe and its useless.
Why I see online ebay for 5g; NOTE10+ 5g and say its 3.5 Ghz. where is that in any Asia spectrum of frequencies ?
Answer is that 5G is not yet a standard. It will be only after IMT 2020 is completed and approved!
It’s almost summer now, so I wonder if Globe Telecom’s “5G” network is more widely deployed and, if so, where? Here’s a map of Globe Telecom’s cellular network coverage in the Philippines: https://www.nperf.com/en/map/PH/-/7534.Globe-Telecom/signal/?ll=12.875461964339756&lg=121.76499999999999&zoom=5
It does not clearly depict 5G network coverage/availability.
I’ll be back in the Philippines again very soon. See you in Palawan!