Maxis expands 4G LTE coverage in Sabah

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KOTA KINABALU: Maxis mobile data services continue to be empowered as Sabah carries on overcoming its topographically-challenged fixed broadband services coverage.

According to Maxis Consumer Business head Dushyan Vaithiyanathan, the 4G LTE presence in Sabah had gone through the roof in the last three months as Maxis tried to keep up with the trend of video based platform usage, where users share their lives through pictures, messages, news, and information on video.

High-end 4G users average around 3GB of data a month, and internationally that is higher than most countries. We are in the top 5% of countries, in terms of data consumption and Sabah is actually one of the highest in Malaysia,” said Dushyan at the Maxis Roadshow at Suria Sabah Shopping Mall here yesterday.

The reason for that is because you don’t have very good fixed broadband in Sabah here. So a lot of users are using their mobile phones as a substitute for their home device, and because of that the GB usage is very high,” he explained.

After making its 4G LTE footprint in Sabah last year, Maxis had expanded its network to even more locations beyond key towns in Sabah.

Customers in secondary towns of Penampang, Tuaran, Papar, Ranau, Keningau, Semporna, Kudat, Putatan, Sipitang, Beaufort and Kota Belud can now enjoy the best 4G experience with fibre-like speeds on their mobile phones – zero buffering on YouTube 96% of the time and 24/7 consistently fast speeds at 15Mbps or more – both indoors and outdoors.

It was implemented more than a year ago but in the last 12 months we have significantly invested more in Sabah, which means we have taken 4G to many more towns and many more people,” said Maxis Chief Technology Officer (CTO) Morten Bangsgaard, adding 36 towns in Sabah and Sarawak are covered with its 4G LTE network.

Furthermore, Bangsgaard said, as projected in the 2015 annual report, Maxis had spent more than any other operator in Malaysia in upgrading its network, where the majority of it went into upgrading and making 4G LTE available in more places.

Besides that, he said Maxis also has its eye on further expanding its 3G network in the state.

When it comes to 4G LTE, Sabah Region head Ng Chak Khin said the ongoing expansion plans have already been laid out, and Bongawan as well as Kota Marudu will be next in Maxis’ Sabah 4G LTE network books.

The plans are now in place to be ready by the third quarter of year. Now Kota Marudu itself already has 4G for Maxis, but we are expanding the coverage further. Obviously we also want to be present in all areas, possibly to have 4G,” said Ng.

To date, Maxis has 4G coverage of more than 90% in Kota Kinabalu and Kuching, and more than 80% in secondary and tertiary towns, said Bangsgaard.

Malaysians love the Internet – it is changing the way we live and work. For Maxis customers in Sabah and Sarawak, smartphone penetration is at 70% and growing.

Between 2014 and 2015, 3G traffic grew by 55% in both states, and customers with 4G access are consuming 20% more mobile Internet compared to those in Peninsular Malaysia,” he added.

Maxis has not only expanded its 4G LTE territory in Sabah, but also helped customers in the state to connect to the 4G services.

Having the foundation, having the network is not enough, we need new plans to identify with 4G users,” said Dushyan.

In addition, we want to get as many people in Sabah to enjoy this 4G network so we want to ensure that they get as much 4G phones as possible,” he added.

Dushyan said the 15% to 20% 4G phones penetration in Sabah had grown exponentially over the last six months.

We are expecting a lot of new data customers on our base, more and more customers are using a lot more data to come on to our base,” he revealed.

We are expecting a lot of postpaid customers, we’ve had some very good success with our new plans. We’ve seen postpaid customers grow significantly with the 4G,” Dushyan added.

Maxis provides its prepaid customers with free unlimited high speed Facebook and high speed Internet (from 1 am – 7 am everyday), as well as unlimited calls to all networks with Hotlink Superrr Internet.

For postpaid customers, they get to own the latest 4G smartphone from as low as RM19 per month with Maxis ground breaking Zerolution program – with zero upfront payment, zero credit card and zero plan contract.

“Sabah is an advanced mobile Internet market and the rapid growth in data consumption in this region is creating a high demand for our services. So naturally we want our customers to enjoy our 4G network by introducing some amazing and timely Internet plans,” said Dushyan.

Especially for Sabah (and Sarawak), we recently enhanced our MaxisONE plan so that our customers can enjoy unlimited data all night long (from 1 am – 7 am) and up to 12GB all day from RM68/month.

This plan is for new postpaid subscribers who sign up with the Zerolution smartphone programme, and valid during a promo period in conjunction with Maxis’ 4G expansion into more towns,” Vaithiyanathan, Maxis Head of Consumer Business,” he added.

Maxis boasts itself nationwide leader in 4G in terms of population coverage, data experience and innovation.

In Sabah, customers in Kota Kinabalu, Labuan, Lahad Datu, Sandakan and Tawau are already enjoying the best 4G experience.

Sabah customers can check out Maxis’ hourly 4G Internet speeds for themselves using its live speedometers at www.maxis.com.my/network.