AT&T wins telecom licence in Indonesia

JAKARTA: AT&T said Wednesday it had won an operating licence in Indonesia, making the US company the first foreign telecom operator to gain direct access to the rapidly expanding Asian country.

AT&T said the Multimedia Services Operator (MSO) licence would allow it to directly deliver services to multinational corporate customers and expand its range of services in the country of 240 million people.

"This underscores our strategy of being a trail-blazer in entering new and emerging markets to support our global... customers wherever their business takes them," AT&T ASEAN general manager Choo Hock Lye said in a statement.

"Many of our key multinational customers have told us they need to be in Indonesia, and while AT&T has been operating a successful business here, the new licence will allow us to deliver an array of new services and make it much easier for us to do business with multinational customers."

The company has about 80 corporate clients in Indonesia through a local joint venture, but has not been licensed to operate on its own until now.

AT&T said Indonesia was "one of the world's fastest growing countries" with GDP growth predicted at 6.4 percent this year and an investment growth rate of 13 percent.

"You're seeing a general trend in the region where countries are making moves to open up," AT&T senior vice president of marketing and global strategy Roman Pacewicz told Dow Jones Newswires.

"Any Asian market is a market we look closely at and evaluate."

AT&T's Asia-Pacific business including India and Malaysia has posted annual double-digit growth over the past five years, compared to relatively flat total business revenue across the whole company.

The US giant won licences in India in 2006 and Malaysia last year. AT&T has invested more than $4 billion since 2006 in international network, systems and applications, and provides IP-based services to 182 countries.

Communications ministry spokesman Gatot Dewa Broto said AT&T was required to make commitments to invest in Indonesia as part of the terms of the licence.

"They see Indonesia as a lucrative market with very positive economic growth," he told AFP.

"With this investment we hope that we will raise the quality and competitiveness of the telecommunications industry."

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011