By Mary Ann Ll. Reyes
The Philippine Star
As part of its bid to become a global company, the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) is eyeing three other countries where it will offer its cellular phone services and operate it as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO).
PLDT chairman Manuel V. Pangilinan said that Smart Communications Inc. in partnership with PLDT Global Corp. (PGC) will begin offering mobile phone services in Italy early next year under an MVNO arrangement with a mobile network operator (MNO) based in the European country.
An MVNO is a company that provides mobile phone service in another country but does not have its own radio frequency allocation, nor does it have all of the infrastructure required to provide mobile telephone service in the foreign country. Instead, MVNOs have business arrangements with traditional mobile operators to buy minutes of use for sale to their own customers or utilize the foreign operator’s infrastructure to offer the MVNO’s own brand or services under a profit-sharing agreement.
The arrangement allows PLDT to expand its presence and offer its mobile services worldwide without the accompanying huge investments. However, Pangilinan emphasized that this does not mean that PLDT or its parent company First Pacific of Hong Kong have abandoned plans of acquiring or investing in foreign telecommunications companies.
Smart and PLDT Global currently have two MVNO arrangements, one in Hong Kong and another in Singapore in partnership with CSL Limited and Mobile One, respectively.
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