MyRepublic loses bid to be Singapore’s 4th telco. The winner is TPG

Despite its best efforts, Singaporean internet service provider MyRepublic is not going to be the city-state’s fourth telco after all. According to an announcement by the Infocomm and Media Development Authority (IMDA), the winner of the New Entrant Spectrum Auction (NESA) is TPG Telecom, which made a bid for US$74 million.

MyRepublic could not beat that with its own bid of US$72 million.

If it tried to outbid TPG, MyRepublic would have to grab a larger market share than its targeted 9%.

TPG, an Australian telecommunications and IT company, now moves to the next stage of the process, the General Spectrum Auction, in which Singapore’s existing telcos (Singtel, Starhub, and M1) can also participate.

TPG will be allocated 60Mhz of spectrum that was set aside for the NESA, in order to provide mobile telecommunications and mobile data services. The earliest the new rights can commence is April 1st, 2017.

From that point, TPG will be expected to make use of the newly allocated spectrum and provide street-level coverage for 4G within 18 months. Within 30 months, it needs to provide tunnel and in-building coverage, and within 54 months, it’s expected to offer coverage in the MRT (subway) system.

The day after for MyRepublic

MyRepublic said in a statement that trying to beat TPG’s US$74 million bid “did not support our vision and business case for mobility in Singapore.”

CEO Malcolm Rodrigues said, “We envisioned being part of a healthy ecosystem of four competitive operators – operators who would be spurred by a new entrant to support unlimited data-centric mobile service offers.”

If it tried to outbid TPG, MyRepublic would have to grab a larger market share than its targeted 9 percent in order to be successful.

MyRepublic Singapore Managing Director Yap Yong Teck called the process “a valuable learning experience” and said the company will remain a part of Singapore’s Smart Nation vision with plans that include an enterprise internet of things platform.

The company will now focus on expanding its broadband services regionally and look for opportunities to offer telecommunications services in other markets. It’s active in Indonesia and New Zealand, and launched in Australia in November.

It claims to have over 160,000 customers across its markets, adding 18,000 every month.

Converted from Singapore dollars. US$1 = S$1.42

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from Tech in Asia https://www.techinasia.com/myrepublic-not-the-4th-telco
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