Demand for telco towers on the rise

The Philippines requires up to 4,000 new towers every year to meet the rising demand for data connectivity across the country, according to independent operator EdgePoint Infrastructure.

EdgePoint CEO Suresh Sidhu yesterday said telco players and tower operators have to put up as many as 4,000 towers annually to expand coverage, particularly for 5G.

“We think that the Philippines will need roughly between 2,000 and 4,000 new sites every year, depending on the cycle,” Sidhu said.

As such, Sidhu said EdgePoint eyes to foray into tower building next year, apart from acquiring existing assets that the telco industry is selling. He disclosed that the firm is talking to a number of tower operators in the Philippines to partner in some of the future projects.

“I think we are always open to acquiring more (telco towers). The focus is to build towers, and so we are in a discussion with tower operators,” Sidhu said.

He said EdgePoint plans to start building some of the tower assets by the middle of next year, as soon as its talks with industry players, particularly fellow operators, are firmed up.

EdgePoint entered the Philippine market in April when its subsidiary Comworks Infratech Corp. bought a portfolio of telco infrastructure from Pangilinan-led PLDT Inc.

Back then, PLDT signed sale and leaseback agreements to dispose of close to 6,000 towers to two foreign tower operators, one of which is EdgePoint.

EdgePoint spent P35 billion to purchase 2,934 towers from PLDT and will take over all of the assets by the middle of 2023.

After the sale, PLDT’s wireless unit Smart Communications Inc. will lease the towers from EdgePoint to serve the connectivity demands of its subscribers.

EdgePoint wants to become the biggest player in tower operations in the country in the long run. It hopes to dominate the growing market for 5G services, especially in urban areas.

At present, EdgePoint has invested a total of $1.5 billion to manage and operate telco towers in Southeast Asia, with expansions focused in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines.

In October, PLDT president and CEO Alfred Panlilio told The STAR that the telco giant could sell another portfolio of tower assets in 2023 as part of efforts to focus on its core business.

Source: Philstar

Philippines improves in digital competitiveness

The Philippines improved two spots in a global digital competitiveness index, but still had the lowest ranking among Southeast Asian countries.

In IMD business school’s World Digital Competitiveness Ranking 2022, the Philippines ranked 56th out of 63 countries with a score of 52.81. This was an improvement from its 58th ranking last year.

The Philippines remained 13th among the 14 Asia-Pacific economies included in the IMD ranking, ahead only of Mongolia.

Among the five main Southeast Asian economies, the Philippines lagged behind Indonesia (51st), Thailand (40th), Malaysia (31st) and Singapore (4th).

Denmark was the top performer globally, with a score of 100, followed by the United States and Sweden, both with 99.81, and Singapore with 99.48.

On the other hand, Venezuela had the worst score of 27.

“This ranking describes the importance of national factors in explaining the digital transformation of companies and the adoption of digital practices by citizens,” World Competitiveness Center Director Arturo Bris said in a statement.

“Digital nations result from a combination of digital talent, digital regulation, data governance, digital attitudes, and the availability of capital,” he added.

Each economy is ranked in indicators grouped under three factors: knowledge, technology, and future readiness.

In terms of knowledge, the Philippines moved up to 62nd this year from 63rd the previous year, as it maintained its ranking for talent (55th) and training (61st) but fell one spot in scientific concentration (57th).

Knowledge refers to intangible infrastructure that enables the discovery, understanding, and learning of new technologies.

The Philippines also saw its ranking in terms of technology rise to 49th from 54th in 2021, as it improved its rank for the technological framework sub-factor to 45th from 49th previously. Its rankings for the regulatory framework and capital sub-factors were unchanged at 62nd and 40th place.

Under the future readiness factor, the Philippines slipped to 58th from 57th spot. This measures the extent to which technology is adopted by the government, businesses, and society.

However, the country improved two spots to 58th in the sub-factor of adaptive attitudes, but fell to 45th from 37th spot in terms of business agility. It remained at 57th spot for the information technology integration sub-factor.

Digital Ranking 2022

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Source: Business World

Asia Must Improve Digital Environment for Entrepreneurs

Four-fifths of developing Asian economies place toward the bottom in a global ranking of digital environments and support systems for entrepreneurs, according to a new index developed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Singapore has the world’s best digital environment and support system for entrepreneurs, according to the Global Index of Digital Entrepreneurship Systems, released today as part of the Asian Development Outlook (ADO) 2022 Update. The United States ranks second, while Sweden takes third place among 113 economies on the list. But 17 of the 21 developing Asian economies included are ranked toward the bottom—underscoring the need for many of them to nurture digital entrepreneurship.

Digitalization offers big growth opportunities for businesses in Asia and the Pacific. It’s a driver of innovation, which is key for economies striving to achieve high-income status. It can also make economies more resilient, as seen when digital technology helped many businesses survive the COVID-19 pandemic, and it can promote inclusive growth by lowering the cost of starting a business.

“Digital entrepreneurship helped economies stay afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it can become a major engine of growth and innovation in the post-pandemic world,” said ADB Chief Economist Albert Park. “For this to happen, there needs to be a supportive environment enabled by conducive policies and incentives. While the environment for Asia’s digital entrepreneurs made substantial strides in the past couple of years, there’s still a lot of room for improvement.”

The index measures the quality of the environment for digital entrepreneurs by looking at the level of digitalization in eight areas: culture, institutions, market conditions, infrastructure, human capital, knowledge, finance, and networking.

In addition to investing in digital infrastructure such as broadband networks, governments need to promote political stability, reliable legal systems, open and competitive markets, and strong property rights. An ADB analysis shows that strong rule of law has a positive effect on enterprise innovation, while less corruption in a society is correlated with an increase in the entry of new entrepreneurs in the market.

For Asia and the Pacific as a whole, an insufficiently supportive culture is among the biggest weak spots when it comes to nurturing digital entrepreneurship. One example is a general lack of public appreciation for the vital role that entrepreneurs play in economic progress. One way to change this is to improve the public perception of entrepreneurship through education.

Global Index of Digital Entrepreneurship Systems Scores

Source: ADB