MANILA, Philippines—Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) expanded its broadband subscriber base by nearly half in 2011, cementing its lead over other networks in the emerging sector of the telecommunications industry.
In a statement, PLDT said the number of its Internet users grew by 45 percent to 2.9 million subscribers at the end of 2011.
PLDT president Napoleon Nazareno said the group’s broadband service revenue remained strong in 2011, posting an 18-percent growth to P18.8 billion from that of the previous year.
“We have 70 percent of the market in terms of revenues and we intend to hold on to that share, if not grow it further this year,” Nazareno said.
In a statement, the company said its home Internet service accounted for more than half of its broadband service revenue with P9.5 billion, following an increase in its subscriber base to 742,000 as of end-2011.
Also, revenues from SmartBro, the company’s wireless Internet brand, reached P6.5 billion following a 19-percent increase in its subscribers to over 1.6 million.
Of the total SmartBro subscribers, over 1.1 million were on the prepaid service.
Meanwhile, new subsidiary Digital Telecommunications Philippines Inc. and its wireless brand Sun Cellular added 551,000 to the PLDT Group’s broadband subscriber base with more than P500 million in revenue in 2011.
Last year, the PLDT Group said it would spend P67 billion up to the end of 2012 for its network modernization program.