U Mobile and Maxis has a long running network sharing and alliance agreement which was signed back in 2011. Last Friday, Maxis announced that Maxis Broadband received a letter from U Mobile stating that they would like to end the agreement, although the agreement was supposed to run for 10 years, the contract had a termination for convenience option which was granted to U Mobile.
This separation has affected the financial results of Maxis for the ending of the year which they commented that they did not expect this to happen. They also said that the termination would take place in stages over 18 months and is expected to complete on 27 December 2018. The agreement not only covered RAN but LTE when the spectrum becomes available and the technology rolls out which could benefit customers.
So what could this mean for U Mobile? There could be a high chance they would want to look for a different partner or build their own stations providing direct service to its customers. As a U Mobile user, I am really opting for the latter, mainly because of the unpredictable signal strength that plagues U Mobile customers.
We have received an official statement from U Mobile as below:
With our growing subscriber base, U Mobile has decided that it will be more appropriate to focus on expanding our own network, especially with the additional spectrum of 2x15MHz of 1800MHz bands and 2x5MHz of 900MHz bands that were awarded by the government last year. The additional 1800MHz was made available on 1 April 2017 whilst the 900MHz will be made available on 1 July 2017. We are currently upgrading our owned networks progressively to support these new spectrum bands so that our customers can enjoy an enhanced network experience when the spectrum bands are turned on and the upgrade is complete.
This notice to terminate the RAN share agreement is not expected to impact our customers’ network experience or our service quality to our customers. We expect to be able to replace the RAN share sites within the stipulated timeline as we continue with our planned network investment program. U Mobile customers can look forward to an enhanced network experience and coverage once the exercise is complete.
What do you think?
