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http://themiddleground.sg/2016/06/02...nd-myrepublic/
MyRepublic: No hang ups about taking on Singtel, M1, Starhub
Jun 02, 2016 05.00PM | Wan Ting Koh linkedin

by Wan Ting Koh

THE first thing out of Mr Malcolm Rodrigues’ mouth when we sat down was a comment about my hair colour. “Did you know your hair is green?” he asked.

Of course I did. It’s my hair.

It’s a personal comment in a professional interview, but over the next hour or so, this CEO of the aspiring telco, MyRepublic, would prove just how much he likes to get personal.

Not with me. With Singtel, M1, and StarHub.

Mr Rodrigues was speaking to me in a meeting room at his Tai Seng office for the interview. He was decked out in a black business suit and had just emerged from a morning meeting. Mine was the first in a day packed back to back with other media interviews, but the 50-year-old seemed more than ready to take me on.

Just like how he seemed ready to take on the telecommunications industry by declaring his interest as early as 2014 to make MyRepublic Singapore’s fourth telco – after M1, StarHub and Singtel.

The three incumbents were given a rude awakening in February this year when the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) decided to allow a fourth entrant in the market. And it was perhaps no surprise to anyone who knew Mr Rodrigues that his appetite was bigger than just providing Internet broadband service. He had grown up in Toronto, a Canadian metropolis known to be the country’s largest technology hub, and the third largest only behind New York and California’s Silicon Valley. Some 14 years ago, the Singapore Permanent Resident was working for StarHub, running its network operations.

During the interview, Mr Rodrigues was articulate, witty and frank – perhaps a little too frank, even. When talking about his competition, he used words such as “ripping off” and “screwing” to describe the way existing telcos were treating its customers.

The current network manned by the incumbents was “not where it should be”, especially when compared to global standards, he said. They were “lining their pockets with their profits, rather than spending it on improving the network.”

Said Mr Rodrigues: “When we build a network and the quality is good, people will realise how bad Singtel’s is and then the incumbents have to spend money to upgrade the network.”

In March this year, he caused a stir by releasing the company’s indicative mobile plans with prices that undercut existing mobile prices (see our report here), causing rival telcos to retaliate in kind. Never mind that MyRepublic had not even successfully bid for spectrum rights. Shortly after the announcement, all three incumbents – M1, StarHub and Singtel – upped the data caps for customers.

Just like Mr Rodrigues had expected. Or so he says. As far as he was concerned, the industry needed a newcomer to shake things up.

“If you’re a monopoly, you can only get away with screwing over the public for so long,” he said.

MyRepublic’s rise in popularity

It seems like the company is gaining popularity too. Since it first took root in Singapore in 2011, the company has gained a steady base of customers. From the 25,000 customers it had one year ago, the number has doubled today. And this doesn’t include their customers in Indonesia and New Zealand, which account for another 50,000.

This might explain why the company reported a year-on-year customer growth of 300 per cent in a May interview with e27 last year.

But these numbers are currently for their internet service and don’t necessarily translate into a mobile customer base. So MyRepublic is hoping to sign up existing broadband customers for their mobile service through a loyalty programme, which offers them cheaper mobile rates.

It doesn’t stop there for MyRepublic. By 2017, the telco hopes to expand its internet service to Sri Lanka and Australia, as these are nearby countries with yet to be tapped-into potential. The company chose Australia for two reasons: the nation had plans for its own National Broadband Network (NBN), plus MyRepublic already has a presence in its neighbour, New Zealand. The company’s other option, Sri Lanka, doesn’t have an NBN, but MyRepublic found that its operation model can be applied there even without it.

And while Mr Rodrigues has big dreams for his company, his immediate plans are even bigger – He wants to keep the incumbents on their toes by reintroducing what they had done away with years ago – unlimited data.

Said Mr Rodrigues: “We’re going to bring high and unlimited data caps back in affordable prices… the other guys will copy us and grudgingly spend money on the network instead of taking it and giving it to their shareholders. In five years, Singapore will be the most advanced mobile network in the world.”

MyRepublic’s gameplan

How to get there? Through innovation. How to get innovative? Through competition, of course.

Said Mr Rodrigues: “When we do mobility we don’t want to do the same old same old. Anytime we do anything our philosophy is it’s got to be different, it’s got to be innovative, it’s got to be disruptive. If we can’t do it, then we don’t do it. When and if we do mobile, it will be innovative, it will be different, it will be disruptive.”

When we do mobility we don’t want to do the same old same old. Anytime we do anything our philosophy is it’s got to be different, it’s got to be innovative, it’s got to be disruptive. If we can’t do it, then we don’t do it. When and if we do mobile, it will be innovative, it will be different, it will be disruptive.
One example is the small cells used in last November’s mobility trials which were cheaper and of a greater capacity than the large cell towers currently used by the incumbents. (See our report about the trials here.) In the two-month trial, the company installed small cell equipment and got 1,000 customers to test the capabilities of the mobile data service. The trial was considered by Mr Rodrigues to be a success, going by the feedback MyRepublic received. Beyond that, it validated the need for a new operator in the country.

He added that the company’s decision to use the NBN for the “backend infrastructure” required to run the mobile network is unprecedented. The Next Generation NBN is a project by the IDA which offers “ultra high speed” connectivity around the entire island, with all telcos leveraging on the OpenNet for their fixed fibre broadband services.

However MyRepublic claims it’s the sole user of the NBN for backhaul, while other telcos have their existing dark fibre infrastructure. That’s where MyRepublic’s advantage is, says Mr Rodrigues, as leasing the Netlink trust at $200 per month is much cheaper than building a dark fibre network which can cost up to $100,000.

Said Mr Rodrigues: “To bring the connection back to a central point we are using the NBN and nobody else is. Everyone is telling us we cannot use the NBN, it doesn’t work, but we use the NBN and it works. [The incumbents] are trying to validate their own investment.”

Other than innovation?

So innovation aside, what else is different? Price. MyRepublic is well-known for its promise to re-introduce unlimited data in its mobile plans for affordable prices.

But would this spiral into a price war?

It is not a price war, insists Mr Rodrigues. To him, it is a matter of offering a different product at the same price.

“We look at your propensity to pay. Most people pay between $50 to $70 and today you get 2GB or 3GB of data. If you are used to paying $60, $70, I don’t want to give you a lower price – I want to take $60, $70 dollars from you, but I want to give you even more,” said Mr Rodrigues.

“An unlimited plan is 200 bucks but how many people subscribe to that plan? If you look at the 6 million people in Singapore it might be 2 per cent who take that plan. It’s not interesting to us.” What Mr Rodrigues is essentially proposing is more broadband for the buck.

But the fact remains that he is offering a much lower price for something that is already available but pegged as a higher price, so how was this NOT a price war, I asked again.

Mr Rodrigues gave an analogy of a Chery QQ and a Maserati and how they’re made with the same cost but sold at different prices.

“You walk into a car dealership, you get $100,000 to spend, they’re selling you a Chery and I’m selling you a Maserati, I can make a Maserati the same price as the Chery, I don’t want to be exclusive, I don’t just want to sell it to 10 people. I just want to sell it cheaper.”

You walk into a car dealership, you get $100,000 to spend, they’re selling you a Chery and I’m selling you a Maserati, I can make a Maserati the same price as the Chery, I don’t want to be exclusive, I don’t just want to sell it to 10 people. I just want to sell it cheaper.
Even after all he just told me, Mr Rodrigues maintains that he is not the real threat to the industry, as he is only seeking 10 to 12 per cent of a market share – a small piece of the pie.

“If we don’t do it, somebody will do it, and it’ll be a big carrier with loads of money and [it will] slaughter them so I don’t know why [they’re against us]. They’re very short sighted. We are not the danger.”

If we don’t do it, somebody will do it, and it’ll be a big carrier with loads of money and [it will] slaughter them so I don’t know why [they’re against us]. They’re very short sighted. We are not the danger.
This myopic view of MyRepublic’s foray into the industry has led to some unsavoury tactics by the competition, he claimed. He said he was told by some equipment vendors that some of the incumbents had approached equipment vendors and banks to warn them against working with MyRepublic since a few years ago when it had expressed interest in running for the fourth telco licence.

He was grateful the vendors didn’t listen. “The vendors told us that if they listened to every threat across the world, they would have no customers,” he said.

“To me it’s a sign of desperation. Before they said there will never be a fourth telco… They laughed at the idea. Now they’re trying everything they can to block it. But we are committed to this. We are committed to bringing change in the market.”

So we’ve heard that Mr Rodrigues wants to bring innovation back to a stagnating telco scene. But even the CEO of an aspiring telco has to have a mobile plan, and that means being a customer of the very incumbent he is competing against.

We asked Mr Rodrigues which he subscribed to. We expected him to say StarHub, since he was a former employee there. However, Mr Rodrigues replied unhesitatingly: M1 – with a monthly data of 3GB for $45 after a corporate discount.

This was clearly inadequate for the busy business man, who claimed that he has “never had a bill cost less than $250” because uses roaming when on the go and exceeds his data limit every time.

So, to no one’s surprise, if MyRepublic could become fourth telco, Mr Rodrigues said: “I will be my first customer”.


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