PLDT to tap OFWs in overseas expansion

HONG KONG—Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) is looking to expand its business abroad by reaching out to the millions of Filipinos working overseas and giving them the chance to stay in touch with relatives at home.

PLDT’s international marketing arm PLDT Global Corp. said it planned to increase the group’s overseas subscriber base by as much as five-fold before the year ends.

“Our main objective is to get the Filipinos abroad. We want them to be our subscribers,” PLDT Global CEO Alex Caeg said.

He said PLDT Global was working on setting up new mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) contracts with telecommunications companies in countries like the United States, Saudi Arabia and other OFW “hot spots.”

PLDT Global’s MVNO agreements in Hong Kong and Singapore have allowed the group to offer call and text services, designed for Filipinos, using the network assets of its foreign partners.

With the SIM cards, which are co-branded as PLDT products, subscribers in the Philippines are able to make calls and text messages to their OFW friends and relatives at regular, non-long distance rates.

OFWs making calls to the Philippines, however, still pay the rates charged in the country where they are.

These services are designed mainly to make it more affordable for OFWs to stay in touch with relatives at home. The company said it expected to sign two new MVNO deals this year.

Its key targets are Taipei, Macau, Guam, Malaysia, the US and Saudi Arabia.

PLDT Global has 100,000 subscribers in Hong Kong and Singapore. “We can get an additional 300,000 to 400,000 in new markets,” Caeg told Manila-based reporters in a briefing here.

For instance, setting up MVNO services in the US will give PLDT access to the 3.5 million Filipinos working there. Having the same setup in Saudi Arabia will also give PLDT the chance to reach a significant portion of the 1.5 million Filipinos in the Middle East.

The company said the international business was one of the most profitable areas of the PLDT group’s business in terms of average revenue per user.