The deal hit the headlines after Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) suspended its review of the planned acquisition, as it found out about the possibility of Simba using unauthorised radio frequency bands for mobile services.

“The termination of the deal is a setback to say the least given that it removes a major growth catalyst for the company (Tuas) in the Singapore telecom market,” said Tim ‌Waterer, chief ⁠market analyst at KCM Trade, while interacting with Reuters.

“The sharp initial sell-off shows how much value the market had priced into the deal, while the partial recovery suggests some investors are betting the company (Tuas) can still find alternative growth paths,” Waterer added further.

Stating that it has been working on plan B in case it retains its 83.9% ownership in M1, Keppel remarked, “We have a 90-day plan to drive M1’s efficiency, which we will activate with immediate effect. This would include reducing technology platform costs and network costs and using AI for automation, as well as product rationalisation.”

Under the original deal, Keppel, after selling its 83.9% interest ⁠in M1 to Simba, would have retained the non-telecoms operations for an enterprise value of SUSD 1.43 billion, which would have given the asset manager net cash of SUSD 1 billion. Had the stake sale ⁠gone through, a SUSD 0.07 to SUSD 0.11 per-share special dividend would have been distributed.

With Tuas exiting the acquisition race, telecom operator StarHub has now entered the picture, with reports suggesting the venture likely becoming a suitor for M1, while Singtel, another Singaporean telecommunications conglomerate, may face more regulatory troubles in its potential bid for M1 due to its leading 44% share in the mobile market.

Singtel’s executive officer, Yuen Kuan Moon, said they “would definitely evaluate where the opportunities are” if they are able to be included in the consolidation.

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The independent internal investigation revealed that Optus provided incorrect instructions to its contractor, Nokia. On top of that, the Finnish telecoms equipment maker selected and approved an incorrect method to proceed with the upgrade, which shut down key equipment but did not redirect calls. The error impacted both normal voice calls and the emergency number “Triple Zero,” but the consequences were different, said Kerry Schott, the report’s author and transport and infrastructure business executive.

“While voice calls found an alternate pathway and their service continued, Triple Zero calls failed,” the report noted.

The outage lasted for almost 14 hours, during which 605 callers sought “Triple Zero” emergency services and assistance of some kind. About 75% of these calls could not connect, with two of them resulting in fatalities.

“Three issues are clear during this incident. The first is the very poor management and performance within the networks and their contractor, Nokia. The process was not followed, and incorrect procedures were selected. Checks were inadequate, controls avoided, and alerts given insufficient attention,” the report remarked.

Apart from finding gaps in process, accountability, escalation, and information protocols, the report also highlighted “challenges in Optus’ organisational culture that have impacted decision-making and response times.”

The review has made 21 recommendations, with prominent among them being strengthening network change-management and escalation processes, improving incident detection and crisis response for emergency services outages.

On December 16, the Optus board conducted a meeting, where it accepted the recommendations and agreed to move swiftly with their implementation.

“The board is taking further action in relation to individual accountabilities flowing from the incident, which will extend from financial penalties through to termination in appropriate cases,” Optus Chairman John Arthur said.

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The payment card industry compliance business owned by Singtel was called SecureTrust and the brand was owned by its cybersecurity arm TrustWave.

Singtel group chief executive Yuen Kuan Moon told the media, “With enterprises pivoting fast to hybrid, multi-cloud environments, the cyberthreat landscape has changed considerably and the need for a focused set of services centred on managed threat detection and response has grown.”

“Trustwave can now better meet those needs by concentrating on its core offerings of managed detection and response, managed security services and consulting services to help businesses reduce complexity and cyber risk in their environments.”

Earlier this year, Singtel launched GENIE, the world’s first portable 5G platform. GENIE has been designed to be transportable and does not require prior equipment installation or infrastructure.

It is of the size of a suit-case and contains a 5G network control kit, standing mount, and a 5G radio antenna. According to Singtel, the installation process of GENIE takes less than hour and it requires nothing more than a standard electrical outlet and window access.

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It is of the size of a suit-case and contains a 5G network control kit, standing mount, and a 5G radio antenna. According to Singtel, the installation process of GENIE takes less than hour and it requires nothing more than a standard electrical outlet and window access.

Dennis Wong, vice president of 5G enterprise and cloud at Singtel told the media, “While many enterprises are aware of 5G, they may not fully understand how their operations can benefit from this technology. By bringing 5G right into the customers’ premises, GENIE can help enterprises to quickly validate their solutions with their partners or verify the performance of their end-to-end use cases with no installation cost. The platform is particularly useful for large enterprises which need to test 5G before deciding to invest in their own dedicated network. Seeing what 5G can do in their own premises will help more enterprises adopt 5G and speed up their digital transformation.”

In December, Singtel launched a next-generation cloud-based networking platform that combines analytics, security and multi-cloud connectivity to offer centralised control and scalability to enterprises to manage their different networks around the world.

Called Liquid-X, it is integrated with Singtel’s Managed Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD WAN) solution to provide round-the-clock performance monitoring, detection and response to any network anomalies to ensure secure cloud connectivity.

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Arthur Lang, Singtel International Group chief executive officer, told the media, “Tapping on UOB AM’s expertise in investment management, we aim to democratise access to digital investments for our customers who value simplicity, affordability, and convenience when managing their finances on a digital platform.”

Both Singtel and UOB Asset Management have said that the new service should be launched by the first half of 2021.  Both parties will explore opportunities to offer robo-advisory and other investment solutions through Singtel’s associates in the region, given the presence of both companies in Asia, including Indonesia and Thailand.

Earlier this year, Singapore-based state-owned investment company Temasek established a new asset management firm to help the company raise more funds independently. The new firm is called Seviora Holdings and it will have assets under management worth $55 billion.

It was reported that the new entity will be set up as the operational holding company for four existing asset management companies currently wholly-owned by or affiliated to Temasek. Those firms are Azalea Investment Management, Fullerton Fund Management Company, InnoVen Capital and Seatown Holdings International.

Temasek said that Seviora will be based in Singapore with its own management team. The primary focus of the firm will be to provide access to a range of investment strategies across return profiles, asset classes and geographies.

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Irrawaddy Green Towers has a network of almost 4000 towers across Myanmar. It is reported that the deal to buy the tower company by CVC is the second-largest deal ever involving Myanmar assets. It is also reported that Irrawaddy’s shareholders, which include Dubai-based investment firm Blu Stone Management and Lebanon-based M1 Group, had agreed to the sale.

While Standard Chartered Bank was the lead financial adviser, UBS acted as the joint financial adviser to Irrawaddy on the deal.

Irrawaddy Towers chairman Georges Makhoul, in a statement said, “Our shareholders’ early capital commitment, the support of the relevant ministries and regulators, the partnership with all the mobile operators, and the engagement with local communities have been vital for success; it has facilitated the business growth to the current leading position. With CVC as a future shareholder, the company is poised for further growth and success for the benefit of the people of Myanmar.”

Recently, Singapore-based telecom giant Singtel deployed its first 5G standalone trial network at its testing facility in Singapore.  It is reported that the telco will use 3.5 gigahertz spectrum and Ericsson’s massive MIMO technology for the trial network. The launch will give enterprises early access to Singtel’s 5G network, the telco said in a statement.

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A total of 21 different firms and consortiums applied for digital banking licences in Singapore; however, according to MAS, only 14 of them met the required criteria. Other parties such as Arrival Bank, Bytedance, Tiktok and iFast Group also applied for licences.

In June 2019, the Monetary Authority of Singapore first announced that it will issue two digital banking licences and three digital wholesale banking licences. The apex bank was expected to announce the name of the successful applicants in June 2020; however, the process was delayed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Anthony Tan, chief executive officer and co-founder of Grab, in a statement, “We expect them to thrive alongside the incumbent banks and raise the industry’s bar in delivering quality financial services, particularly for currently underserved businesses and individuals,” said MAS MD Ravi Menon in a statement. A handful of countries, including the UK, India and Hong Kong, have streamlined their regulations in recent years to grant tech companies the ability to operate as digital banks.

Ride-hailing firm Grab and telecom operator Singtel formed a consortium last year to apply for the digital full bank license. Their combined experience and expertise will allow them to empower more people to gain better control of their money and achieve better economic outcomes for themselves, their businesses and families, Tan added.

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Called Liquid-X, it is integrated with Singtel’s Managed Software-Defined Wide Area Network (SD WAN) solution to provide round-the-clock performance monitoring, detection and response to any network anomalies to ensure secure cloud connectivity.

Mr Lim Seng Kong, Managing Director, Singtel Enterprise Business at Group Enterprise told the media, “The global pandemic has driven more enterprises to rely on the cloud to host their data and solutions. For enterprises with global operations, it is a challenge to manage multiple clouds hosting their workloads as each cloud requires a separate connectivity. Liquid-X’s launch is timely in addressing enterprises’ need for an all-in-one cloud-based network solution that simplifies and secures their cloud connectivity, provides a flexible, cost-efficient way to access cloud workloads globally and gives insights into network performance.”

The telco reported a net profit of $345 million for the half-year that ended September 30, 2020, which was attributed to the 11 percent rise in pre-tax profits from regional associates such as India’s Bharti Airtel. Recently, Airtel reported its highest ever consolidated quarterly revenue of $3.46 billion.

Singtel named Anna Yip, previously the chief executive officer of Hong Kong operator SmarTone, as deputy chief executive officer of its Singapore consumer business. Yip stepped down in August after four years of handling SmarTone’s operations in Hong Kong and Macau.

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Bill Chang, chief executive officer of group enterprise at Singtel told the media, “Covid-19 has brought a new urgency to digital transformation for many sectors. Having unveiled our first 5G use case with our 24/7 unmanned pop-up retail store in September, our 5G SA trial network offers enterprises from across industries the opportunity to develop and test applications to accelerate automation and digitalisation.

“With 5G’s low latency and scalability, enterprises can not only drive efficiencies and make better and more cost-effective decisions but also deliver richer customer experiences. The launch of this 5G SA trial network is also an important step as we get ready for commercial 5G SA. We welcome enterprises to harness the power of 5G to future-proof their businesses and catalyse their digital transformation at 5G Garage.”

In addition, the global cloud-gaming provider Ubitus has used Singtel’s 5G standalone network for a 5G cloud-gaming trial, media reports said. Last month, another Singapore-based telecom operator launched its 5G non-standalone network in Singapore.

M1, which is one of the four major telcos in Singapore, claimed that it was the first to offer 5G access to all its customers without any limitations. During the same period, Singtel launched its 5G non-standalone network and introduced a three-month trial for its consumers.

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In a press release, Singtel said that it is also offering an additional 10GB of local data to its users. Singtel also said its 5G network can deliver more than 1Gbps of speed and uses the 3.5GHz frequency of Singtel’s newly expanded spectrum holdings along with its existing 2100MHz spectrum.

To first batch of regions to have Singtel 5G service are Harbourfront, Bugis and Dhoby Ghaut.
Yuen Kuan Moon, chief executive officer at Singtel, consumer Singapore, told the media, “With Covid-19 driving everyone online and dramatically increasing our reliance on digital services to work, learn and play, 5G is set to be a huge enabler in our lives in this new normal.”

A nationwide roll out of its 5G services is expected in the next 5 years.

Earlier this year, Singtel along with a joint venture between StarHub-M1 won a licence to operate 5G networks across Singapore, according to Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA). It was reported that the firms will have to provide 5G network for at least half of Singapore by the end of 2022.

This marks Singapore’s first move in 5G network licencing. Previously, Singapore’s telecom authority had received three bids. Singtel and TPG Telecom submitted their respective proposals, while StarHub and M1 joined forces to submit the proposal.

Singtel, which is the country’s largest telecom operator in the country, has decided to use equipment provided by Sweden-based Ericsson.

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