Ooredoo, Qatar's telecoms operator, will start rolling out its telecoms network in Myanmar now that it has formally accepted a licence to offer its services in the South East Asian country.
Ooredoo said it was on track to offer mobile services in six months' time. The company plans to initially service the major cities of Myanmar. Then it will gradually expand to rural and remote areas of the country.
Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, represents one of the last major greenfield, or least-connected, places for telecoms operators. Myanmar has a population of about 53 million people, but its mobile penetration at the end of last year was just a little over 6 per cent. Arabian Gulf telecoms companies are constantly looking for new markets for expand to, as their local markets are saturated with about a 200 per cent penetration rate.
However, the market also presents big challenges to Ooredoo, according to Matthew Reed, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms and Media in Dubai
"They will have to build out their networks from scratch, the infrastructure in Burma is quite poor and the spending power of many Burmese people is likely to be quite low," said Mr Reed.
In addition to Ooredoo, Norway's Telenor Group also won a telecoms licence in Myanmar.
Ooredoo said that it would offer a wide range of mobile communications services in Myanmar besides voice and data. Mobile money services and mobile health services are part of its plan. Mobile money services are popular in developing countries whose banking systems are not yet mature.
In recent months Ooredoo has started building out its 3G network in the country. It can be upgraded to 4G in the coming years, said Ooredoo.
selgazzar@thenational.ae