Focused On Dominating Mobility

With over 90% of its subscribers gained through non-MNP related product offerings, Celcom does not plan on investing significantly to promote MNP.
“Telcos in the region have seen their margins eroded by between 3% and 5% post-MNP. However, we do not see that degree of margin erosion here in Malaysia, the costs of subsidies have been lower. Telcos should see their margins stabilise after two quarters,” said a telco analyst with OSK Research.

That’s a relief in a volatile global business environment. Celcom (M) Bhd has been quite aggressive in number porting advertising compared to the other telcos. Dato’ Sri Shazalli Ramly, Celcom’s Chief Executive Officer, shares his views on changes that is driving the industry in all aspects of mobile services and customers experiencing even higher standards of mobile communications.

Do we really need MNP? Do you think the concept will succeed in the Malaysian market, given the fact that operators may have to shoulder a cost burden?
MNP is a national agenda which was introduced as an effort to provide mobile consumers with the freedom to move between service providers, with the hopes that it will lead to healthy competition in the mobile telecommunications industry. While MNP reduces one of the main barriers to subscriber churn, which is the custody of the same mobile number, its potential negative effects to subscriber retention are likely to be over-rated. Service providers should also realise that MNP brings competitive opportunities for intrepid service providers to leverage on.
The extent of its success remains to be seen as we just launched on 15 October 2008.

Can you elaborate on the different types of portability?
To my understanding, there is Fixed Number Portability (FNP) and Mobile Number Portability (MNP). FNP allows a consumer to move their existing fixed line number to a new fixed line provider without having to change their number. As for MNP, it allows consumers to switch service providers while maintaining their existing mobile number.
A key requirement in number portability is to maintain databases of ported numbers. How effective is this system with regard to availability, maintenance, operating costs, etc.?
It is important to maintain the ported number database in order to ensure calls can be routed correctly. The ported number database can be either maintained centrally by a clearing house or it can be de-centralized. In Malaysia, the de-centralised approach has been adopted. However, there is a clearing house centrally located that processes all porting request from the customers who request for porting.


What are the likely benefits that the proposed MNP can offer to telecommunication companies?
MNP gives the telecommunications industry stimulated and healthy competition which allows telcos to compete fairly and directly for customers by promoting their service and pricing advantages.

And the challenges?
As mentioned above, MNP encourages competition, which means that telcos must find a way to optimise its functionality and efficiency as well as continue to offer the best products and services. Many customers may likely port to a new network / service provider that offers a Value Added Service (VAS) that its competitors might not provide.

Will it benefit consumers and operators or will it lead to needless competition?
The main benefit of MNP to the mobile telecommunications industry as a whole is the stimulation to competition it causes. MNP increases competition by either lowering or eliminating the cost for customers to switch numbers thereby increasing the incentive of service providers to compete directly against one another for existing mobile users as well as new users. Increased competition encourages all service providers to improve the overall value of service offered to customers and to be more innovative with products and services.

Service providers can only improve the value added to customers over the long term by improving the efficiency of operations thereby improving the health of the industry as a whole. From the customer’s point of view, it can be very advantageous as telco companies would, of course, try to retain their customers, so might offer special rates and discounts to keep them from switching to another carrier.

Do customers too have things to fear in MNP?
No, they don’t. With MNP, customers have the freedom to choose the service provider with the best overall value, while simultaneously avoiding the hassle of changing mobile phone numbers for a minimal fee. If anything, MNP is considered a good offering for customers.

Will there be a re-branding exercise as a result of MNP being implemented?
No, Celcom will not introduce a re-branding exercise. We will continue to implement all our campaigns and marketing plans, which have been part of our agenda from the beginning of the year. Independent of MNP, we still need to aggressively market our products and services in order to win over customers. As such, we’ve been focused on ensuring the right offer to the right customers. The current situation of allowing customers to port numbers should further enhance the attractiveness of Celcom’s product offers as well as undisputed network quality and customer service, thus making the switch to Celcom easier.

How would Celcom position itself to capitalise on the growth opportunities?
We will focus on our strengths which is having the widest network at the best speeds while delivering the highest level of customer service. Celcom recently won several prestigious awards from the Customer Relationship Management & Contact Centre Association Malaysia (CCAM) Annual Contact Centre Awards which are :
1) Corporate Category – Gold Award for Best Contact Centre under 50 seats (Technical Helpdesk) 2) Corporate Category – Best Mystery Shopper Award 3) Bronze Award for Best Contact Centre Team Leader (Technical Helpdesk)
Previous CCAM awards we have won include :
1) Gold Award for Best Outsourced Service Contact Centre (Customer Premier Service) 2) Prestige Award for Most Significant Achievement 3) Gold Award for Best Contact Centre Professional Outsourced 4) Bronze Award for Best Contact Centre Professional Outsourced

What would be Celcom’s strategy to weather the implications of MNP, particularly with its large mobile subscriber base?
Celcom will focus on maintaining excellent customer experience from the point of view of network and customer service. We also believe our customer loyalty programs such as Xpax Bonus and Bonus Blue (for Prabayar Celcom Blue customers), will be a pulling factor for users who want more value for their money.

Can you share with us several of your innovative ways to make your services offerings a continuous value to your customers?
As mentioned above, we are very much focused on loyalty programs to retain our customers, e.g. airtime bonuses and handset subsidies, and we believe that MNP will not be a big hindrance to us. In a nutshell, Celcom is the mobile operator with the FASTEST, CLEAREST, WIDEST and BEST network, so we are confident that we are able to retain our customers.


Can you tell us more on Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) “TIME 3” Plan and what has Celcom contributed so far since August 2008?
I think this question is best directed to MCMC as they would be able to elaborate further on the Time 3 Plan. Celcom has been supportive of the Time 3 Plan and along with other industry players, has assisted MCMC in identifying 1,200 Time 3 sites.