National Transmission Corp. says potential telecom partners express interest

NATIONAL Transmission Corp. (TransCo) claims to have received expressions of interest from 10 mostly foreign entities that wish to partner with the state-led agency in its plan to become a third player in the country’s telecommunications sector.

“What I did was to reply to them, for them to come out with a policy and a project concept to help us to design the law that will be passed by the Congress,” Melvin A. Matibag, TransCo president and chief executive officer, told reporters.

He previously said that he would ask lawmakers to amend TransCo’s charter by expanding its business to include telecommunications. TransCo owns the country’s power transmission assets, which are being operated and maintained by privately owned National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) under a congressional franchise.

Mr. Matibag said he could not enumerate offhand the identities of the interested companies except that many of them are Chinese. He also said Japanese and Indonesian companies were keen on the project. He named the local company as Philippine Telegraph and Telephone Corp.

“But of course we have to validate [if their interest is authentic],” he said, adding that the expressions of interest were sent via phone, letter, text and e-mail.

He said he had asked experts in the sector, who told him that the only entity that could compete with Smart Communications, Inc. and Globe Telecom, Inc. is the government.

A private company with financial and technical capability will be spared from securing a congressional franchise as TransCo is on its way to filing an application to operate and manage a full telecommunications business, he added.

He said at least 10 lawmakers in both Houses of Congress are keen to sponsor TransCo’s charter amendment.

Asked whether NGCP was informed of TransCo’s plan, he said he has yet to although the two “were having meetings.”

In June, NGCP said it was preparing to formalize an agreement with the government on the use of the power grid operator’s fiber optic network for the national broadband program.

NGCP said it has been chosen as a partner by the Department of Information and Communications Technology for the program, which it described as bringing the country’s average internet speed closer to those of “first-world countries.”

The company said its fiber optic cables, which cover 6,154 kilometers or 160,779 fiber kilometers, will be the primary network of the program that aims to bring wi-fi connection all over the country.

NGCP previously declined to comment on TransCo’s plan. —