KUALA LUMPUR: International roaming will be phased out upon the integration of the Asean Economic Community (AEC), said Axiata Group Bhd president and chief executive officer Datuk Seri Jamaludin Ibrahim.

“We would not be seeing international roaming upon AEC integration, because I believe voice will be getting cheaper eventually,” he told The Edge Financial Daily on the sidelines of the 12th Asean Leadership Forum yesterday.

Jamaludin said he is not worried that AEC integration would pose a threat to Axiata (fundamental: 0.85; valuation: 1.1) as it has already established its presence in the Asean region ahead of the regional integration.

Axiata is currently the second largest telecommunications group by subscriber base in Asean, behind Singapore Telecommunications Ltd.

In the financial year ended December 2014 (FY14), gross revenue for Axiata’s Malaysian operations fell by 3.6%, mainly due to revenue declines in voice (5.3%) and short messaging service (27.8%). Data revenue continued to show an uptrend, however, registering growth of 24.1% year-on-year.

Meanwhile, AirAsia X Bhd chairman Tan Sri Rafidah Aziz suggested the setting up of a central authority to resolve non-tariff barriers among AEC member countries.

“There must be a central authority that must have the power to ensure all these things (AEC integration) happen, and we should not be so idealistic as to not take into account domestic imperatives,” she said. “Every country has its own domestic problems. We should take that into account before we push for 100% duty free. The only way to do that is to talk about that issue.”

The two-day forum which ended yesterday was organised by Axiata to discuss “Realising the Asean Economic Community — The Game Changer”. Rafidah was one of the panel speakers.

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on April 28, 2015.