KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 19): Malaysia is the only developing country within the Asean region with affordable broadband, according to a report released by The Economist Intelligence Unit.
The report, titled 'The Future of broadband in South East Asia', was commissioned by Huawei and showed that while digital inclusion has been the country's core focus - the challenge lies in furthering broadband penetration.
The report suggested that mobile broadband was an "excellent" short-term solution to taking connectivity to remote locations, but noted that the conversion of spectrum allocation could often be slow, leading to delays in implementation.
Currently, mobile phone penetration is almost double that of broadband penetration at 142.5%.
Speaking during a panel discussion on the findings of the report on the last day of the KL Converge forum here today, Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) chairman Datuk Mohamed Sharil Tarmizi said the focus was on building a proper connectivity ecosystem.
"When we first started, a technological agnostic approach was taken, that is, we used whatever method necessary to get people connected.
"If inclusion comes at the price of speed for the time being, we are ready for a temporary trade off even as we work towards increasing both speed and inclusion through the private and public sectors' extensive efforts," he said.
According to the report, although Malaysia's Internet speed falls below the Asean average, it makes up for it in Internet usage by being ahead of all Asean countries except Singapore.
Meanwhile, Sharil said the upgrading works of 120,000 Internet ports belonging to Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) should be complete by the first or second quarter next year.
"This is being carried out under their high speed broadband programme and will mean that it will go up to speeds of 100 megabits per second (mbps)," he said.
"We're starting first with the Klang Valley, Penang, Johor Baru, and then we will roll out more when there is more demand," he added.
TM's Unifi broadband service currently provides speeds of about 33-35 mbps.
The report also found that despite the financial and practical challenges of broadband implementation, it remains the easier part of the supply and demand equation.
"More difficult are the challenges of improving affordability and raising awareness of the benefits of broadband adoption," it said.
Additionally, it noted that for every 10% increase in broadband penetration, a country is able to register about 1.38% increase in economic growth.
Kl Converge, Malaysia’s inaugural creative digital event, is jointly organised by the Ministry of Communications and Multimedia, Multimedia Development Corp, MCMC and the National Film Development Corp.