Dito to launch on March 8

Dito Telecommunity Corp. is ready to make its commercial debut on March 8, initially rolling out its services in Mindanao and Visayas.

“We want the public to know that on March 8, we will be having our commercial launch. It is going to be launched in waves. It is a phased launch,” Dito chief administrative officer Adel Tamano said in a virtual briefing yesterday.

Tamano said there would be 17 cities and nearby municipalities, including Davao and Cebu, where Dito’s services would initially be commercially available.

“We are going to start first in Mindanao. There’s a sentimental reason to that because if you recall, before Dito became Dito, we were the Mindanao Islamic Telephone Co. and in fact, it was actually set up to serve the underserved areas in Mindanao. So we thought it fitting to start there,” he said.

Before June, however, Tamano said Dito’s services would be commercially available nationwide. “I can assure you that by the second quarter of this year, we will already be commercially available nationally,” he said.

Tamano said that by March 8, Dito is expected to have 10 to 20 physical points of sale in Visayas and Mindanao.

Dito subscribers will have the following mobile number prefixes: 0991, 0992, 0993, 0994, 0898, 0897, 0895, and 0896.

With its nearing commercial launch, Tamano said the company would be relying on its upcoming users to serve as its endorsers.

“The direction of the company is we’d rather spend on towers and networks than on K-pop stars. I do enjoy the K-pop and Korean drama once in a while, but we’d rather spend our money on towers and networks for the consumers,” he said.

Telco giants PLDT and Globe have recently tapped K-pop megastars BTS and Blackpink as endorsers.

“The expectations from the Filipino public are really high and we hope we can meet that,” Dito chief technology officer Rodolfo Santiago said.

As part of the issuance of its certificate of public convenience and necessity in July 2019, Dito was mandated to deliver its commitments of 37.03 percent national population coverage with a minimum average broadband speed of 27 Mbps in its first year of operation.

The company was able to pass its first audit, with its minimum average broadband speed recorded at 85.9 Mbps for 4G and 507.5 Mbps for 5G.

“Our commitment is a minimum of 27 Mbps. We wanted to be faster, but expect that the result of the audit will not be the same level when we already have some subscribers. But we will maintain our commitment of minimum average speed,” Santiago said.