SLT to facilitate network access to 90% of population

Kiththi Perera

By Nishel Fernando 
 Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT) is to enhance its network access to cover 90 percent of the country’s population within this year by continuing its aggressive investments in expanding extensive fibre optic network and 4G converge, as the telco operator prepares to launch several digital services equipped with fintech payment solutions from next quarter onwards. 

“We have a very aggressive plan to expand our footprint across the country including expansion of our 4G network through Mobitel this year. We believe with these two initiatives we can cover 90 percent of the population in the country through our fibre, wire line and wireless technologies,” SLT CEO K.A. Kiththi Perera told Mirror Business. 

Simultaneously, SLT plans to launch a range of digital services to government, public and private enterprises commencing early next quarter of this year.

“At least one digital service will be launched every month henceforth. It will be range applications, and it will not be essentially within the domain of communication; it could be a food ordering system from restaurants for an example. There are so many opportunities. We want to transform ourselves; we want to step into the digital arena,” he elaborated. 

Despite having a record number of mobile subscriptions which amounts to 29 million in Sri Lanka, the country’s internet penetration remains around 32 percent while the e-commerce penetration remains at low levels. 

“We have 30 percent of active internet users engaging in social media. The interesting part is how many of them go online to buy a product or service and how many of them have a mobile money account? If you look at the statistics, only 6.2 percent of them go online to buy a product or service while only 2.4 percent have a mobile money account, which is relatively low compared to global statistics,” Perera pointed out. 

Hence, he emphasised that the broadband and 4G penetration need to be expanded in order for these services to be accessible.

SLT already laid over 45,000 kms of fibre infrastructure which offer broadband speeds of up to 100 Mbps in the country over past few years which includes connecting 850 State institutions island-wide with high-speed fibre connectivity under the Lanka Government Network (LGN 2.0) initiative within six months.

Its subsidiary, Mobitel rolled out of its largest 4G LTE expansion project and plan to install over 1,600 LTE sites across the island this year. It’s expected that Mobitel will be increasing its total 4G LTE footprint to approximately 2,600 LTE sites in the country by mid this year, reaching 76 percent of Sri Lanka’s population.

Perera noted that these programmes will be accelerated this year to reach envisaged cover of 90 percent of the country’s population with high 
speed internet. 

The increased internet penetration is also expected to accelerate Sri Lanka’s economic growth. According to studies, a 1 percent increase in mobile broadband penetration can increase the GDP by 0.15 percent on average while a 1 percent increase in fixed broadband penetration can increase the GDP by 0.08 percent on average.

SLT expects that fibre connectivity will be a key enabler to introduce digital services such as IoT services, fintech services, IPTV services, cloud services, data analytics and data centre services to the general consumers as well as businesses, enterprises and Government customers.

Perera revealed that SLT is currently in discussions with several leading ICT firms including Huwaei, Cisco, IBM, VMware and VMware to develop its digital ecosystem in order offer digital services. 

“They are talking to us to now to enter into a broader collaboration to offer world class services to our customers and the general public. We are also talking to them to bring a right fintech platform where our consumers can do online transactions securely by connecting other key partners in the ecosystem,” he said. 

SLT also recently expanded its cloud storage solution offering to general public, which was earlier restricted to our enterprise and Government customers.

SLT aimed to become Sri Lanka’s preferred digital lifestyle provider by 2022 through its five year digital strategy.