YANGON — Telenor Group will launch fourth-generation cellular service in Myanmar as early as this summer, Petter Furberg, CEO of the Norwegian carrier’s local arm, told The Nikkei.
Telenor Myanmar is testing 4G in four cities. The rollout will begin when more spectrum becomes available, Furberg said. Myanmar’s government plans to hold an auction for frequencies in the 2,600-megahertz band this summer at the earliest. Qatar’s Ooredoo began offering 4G on open spectrum in May.
Furberg also expects the company to get approval soon from the Central Bank of Myanmar to offer mobile banking, which could include money transfers. Telenor Myanmar will be the first telecommunications company in the country to provide such services. It is working with a local bank to test the system.
Telenor Myanmar is the country’s second-largest carrier behind state-owned Myanma Posts and Telecommunications, with roughly 16 million customers. It has more than twice as many users as Ooredoo despite entering the market a month later, in September 2014. Competition is set to heat up further with Viettel, which is run by the Vietnamese military, to join the fray soon.
Source: The Nikkei Asian Review
