TM’s UniFi ups ante on broadband competition - The Edge

KUALA LUMPUR: Broadband providers throughout the nation, and one television broadcaster, will have to keep a careful eye on their market share after TELEKOM MALAYSIA BHD [] (TM) on Thursday, March 25, announced a highly competitive pricing scheme for its new high-speed broadband retail offering, also known as UniFi.

At RM149 per month for the entry level retail plan, VIP 5, subscribers will receive up to a five megabit per second (mbps) transfer rate. At that speed, a typical song file of about five megabytes in size will take, on paper, eight seconds to transfer.

The next plan, VIP 10, subscribers will see a connection speed of 10 mbps for RM199, while the premium plan, VIP 20, will provide subscribers with a speed of 20 mbps for RM249.

While critics would argue that TM’s high speed service will only be available in Zone 1 areas, that is, areas of high economic impact, TM’s CEO Datuk Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa announced yesterday at a press briefing that it would also lower the price for its fastest StreamyX broadband plan.

The latter falls under TM’s broadband for the general populace (BBGP), which is TM’s broadband offering in areas falling into the Zone 2 category.

“Obviously, we need to adjust the pricing for the 4mbps plan on Streamyx. Today, we have the combo package available at RM160, (but) with immediate effect, we will reduce it to RM140,” Zamzamzairani said.

The pricing of the plans came after the launch of the National Broadband Initiative and the National High Speed Broadband Project by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak on Wednesday night. TM’s UniFi service will be available in Taman Tun Dr Ismail, Bangsar, Subang Jaya and Shah Alam in its first phase of deployment.

[More at http://www.theedgemalaysia.com/business-news/162404-tms-unifi-ups-ante-on-broadband-competition.html]