Singapore's Singtel Merges With Telkom Indonesia

Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel) said on Thursday it is in talks to integrate PT Telkom Indonesia (Persero) Tbk's fixed broadband business with PT Telekomunikasi Selular (Telkomsel).

"This (integration) represents a rare opportunity for Telkomsel to enter the high growth fixed broadband market in Indonesia with an industry leader that has some 70 per cent share of market," said Singtel, which owns a 35 per cent stake in Telkomsel.

Singapore Telecommunications Ltd, or Singtel, is a Singaporean telecommunications company and one of the country's four major telcos. With 4.1 million users, the firm is Singapore's largest mobile network provider, and through subsidiaries, it has a total mobile subscriber base of 640 million people as of the end of fiscal year 2017. Until 1995, the firm was known as Telecommunications Equipment. Singtel provides Internet service provider (ISP), IPTV (Singtel TV), mobile phone networks, and fixed line telephone services.

Telkomsel is Indonesia's largest cellular telecommunications company, with 169.5 million customers as of 2020. The firm runs a GSM network on frequencies 900-1800 MHz, as well as 3G, 4G, and 5G services on additional frequencies. Telkomsel offers a range of mobile services, the most notable of which are Telkomsel PraBayar (a consolidation of Telkomsel's prepaid services simPATI, kartuAs, and LOOP) and Telkomsel Halo (formerly kartuHalo). These companies differ in terms of payment methodology (prepaid vs. postpaid) and pricing. Telkomsel controlled 66.4% of the Indonesian mobile phone market in the first quarter of 2020.