Two new towercos are to be formed in both Cambodia and Laos. In Cambodia, MNO CellCard are carving out towers into a new entity called Telemobile while across the border in Laos Malaysia-based OCK Group have created a joint venture with Laos Ministry of Finance to establish OCK Laos Towerco. What does this mean for these two markets and what do we know so far? Find out below!
Cambodia
The Cambodian market is home to three major MNOs: Smart (Axiata), Cellcard (CamGSM), and Metfone (Viettel). Cellcard, Smart and Metfone account for 90% of Cambodia’s 21.4mn subscribers (in a population of 16.7mn) and are joined by China-backed Seatel and Cooltel.
While telecom infrastructure sharing is in its infancy in Cambodia, three towercos call the Khmer nation their home.
edotco Cambodia was established in May 2012 with just five employees and 150 tenancies, and has impressively grown to 3116 owned sites, 4,359 managed sites and 4,392 tenancies in the decade since. edotco is owned by Smart’s parent company Axiata.
The Malaysian headquartered towerco is joined by local players CamTower link – who’s 18 sites are all located around the famous Angkor Wat UNESCO world heritage site, following a partnership with the landmark temple’s custodians.
Global Tower Corporation (GTC), another towerco, owns and manages around 80 sites.
Estimated Tower ownership in Cambodia (pie chart):
Both Cooltel & Smart’s sites are managed by edotco.
Cellcard will soon boost the active towerco number up to 4. The MNO is carving out 2,300 towers into a new entity by the name of Telemobile. Initially, Telemobile will take over management of CellCard’s towers while also providing energy for the operator. The portfolio is a combination of rooftop and macro sites and will mark the first time that a towerco has taken responsibility for power in the country.
The carve out has already begun building new towers for CellCard and has completed its first tower with plans to deliver 40 more sites in the months to come.
Competition for sites will be fierce as tower builders will strive for efficiency but also encourage best practice in the market. TowerCo will avoid erecting sites in the same location as other towers, to reduce the parallel infrastructure deployed in the country.
Whilst the country’s leading MNOs had been carrying out 5G trials following an agreement with Huawei to rollout 5G infrastructure, spectrum in the country is yet to be awarded. Regulators were concerned that there would be inefficiencies and waste if all five MNOs built their own 5G infrastructure, so withdrew the licenses that the operators had been using for their 5G trials.
TowerXchange is also aware of an ESCO that is preparing to enter the ever changing Cambodian telecom infrastructure market.
Laos
Laos is a relatively new market for towercos, with the national government and local firm Click Lao Marketing and Consultancy signing an agreement with China Tower Corporation (CTC) to establish the Southeast Asia Tower company in 2018. Southeast Asia Tower has since begun building 27 towers.
In 2019, edotco presented a filing at the Bursa Malaysia announcing its entrance into Laos via the purchase of an 80% stake in local entity Mekong Tower Company Ltd. (MTCL). The filing stated that the Laos tower market is expected to undergo intense growth in tandem with a national drive towards 4G adoption, with an estimated demand of no less than 5,000 towers required over the next 3 years.
However, edotco are yet to build any towers since Q4 2020, meaning they still only own 14 towers two years after entering the country.
Things appear to be on the up for the country though, as Malaysian tower builder OCK Group signed a shareholder agreement with Laos Ministry of Finance to expand its presence in the country.
OCK Laos TowerCo will be a joint venture between the two parties, with OCK owning a controlling 70% stake. Applications for an official tower licence is ongoing.
Estimated tower ownership in Laos:
The timely entrance allows OCK to be able to tap into the new 5G industry in Laos, according to OCK group managing director Sam Ooi Chin Khoon.
The country is home to four MNOs, three of which are owned by the government. TPlus, ETL and Lao Telecommunication Company, are joined by Viettel back Unitel. Some degree of sharing exists within the government owned operators. TPlus have access to 1,000 of LTC’s towers. Best Telecom, a fixed wireless and ISP that also acts as a MVNO operate from ETL towers.
The market holds great potential for growth with only 80% SIM penetration with 5.6mn mobile connections and 7.2mn inhabitants.
