SingTel’s decision to bundle public Wi-Fi access with its customers’ mobile plans is down to data offloading efforts, according to one expert.
King-Yew Foong, vice-president at research company Gartner, says that making hotspot access easier to smartphone owners is a workable way for the Singaporean telecoms firm to manage rapidly growing data traffic.
He also claims that the carrier can save money by deploying Wi-Fi, as it’s cheaper and more cost-effective than it would be to invest in the equivalent mobile infrastructure.
SingTel’s plans, which were officially unveiled yesterday, will see customers on certain plans given access to more than 100 connection points across 11 of Singapore’s busiest locations, techgoondu.com reports. The firm claims these hotspots, when launched next week (August 19), will offer average speeds between 4Mbps and 10Mbps – at least five times faster than many of the island’s free hubs.
The firm’s vice president of consumer marketing, Johan Buse, says the move is essential if 4G congestion is to be reduced. He was quoted by straitstimes.com as saying: “We see in some locations that no matter how much gear we plug in, we max out at certain times.
“With data growth, people are using more and at more locations. In order to make sure the experience is good, we need to offer Wi-Fi offload.”
