DITO Telecom Can’t Provide Fast Internet in Remote and Crowded Places
DITO telecommunication company explained that they can’t prioritize remote and crowded places to provide fast internet connection.
DITO admitted inability to prioritize remote areas in the country will not be able to serve ‘unserved and underserved areas’ in its promised high-speed internet rollout as a response to Senator Grace Poe’s challenge that the third telco could also provide connectivity to remote barangays.
This is due to time constraints and the COVID-19 pandemic. DITO Telecommunity’s Chief Technology Officer Rodolfo Santiago made the announcement at the recent Senate hearing on the renewal of the telco’s legislative franchise.
“Since we’re only given one year to achieve the 37% population coverage, we prioritized areas that are most densely populated. It is quite rational that when our commitments are time-bound, we go to the most optimum way of meeting them,” said Santiago.
Santiago’s confession confirms the Asia-Pacific industry think tank CreatorTech report that Dito focuses on areas with large populations under its license. He said that they have to focus on high population densities such as the National Capital Region of Metro Manila, Cebu, and Davao City.
“Dito committed to 37% population coverage in the first year. The easiest way to achieve this would be to focus on high population densities such as the National Capital Region of Metro Manila, Cebu, and Davao City,” he said.
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Senator Poe also challenged Dito to fulfill its promise to cover 37% of the population in the first year of its operation. The company won the franchise bid in 2018 to become the country’s third telco.
“In your commitment, you said you will cover 37% of the population in the first year. I understand you will not be able to set up in all underserved and unserved areas but at least you should be able to present to this committee a few that you’ve already started doing,” said Poe.
Poe added that Dito has submitted a list of 7,425 barangays that it has promised to serve in the first year of application, most of which are in NCR which is the easiest to deploy.
Aside from covering 37% of the population during its first year of operation, Dito also promised to provide 27 Mbps minimum average internet speed to 84% of the population within five years. The telco had to postpone its scheduled technical launch last July for six months due to the pandemic.
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