So what’s happening at Digital Nasional Berhad, the state owned Ministry of Finance incorporated entity which is in charge of rolling our the nation’s 5G aspirations? The company has been without a Chief Executive Officer since Ralph Marshall resigned sometime middle of this year.
Its been six months DNB has been without a leadership helming the RM15 billion ship, there has also been changes at the top management after Ralph leaving the group with Chief Technical Officer going back to Telekom Malaysia and other team members following suit.
Communication Minister first announced a new CEO back in August 2023 confirming an appointment before the end of the month, than he made two more announcement on potential appointment but to only keep mum ever since. Malaysia is not short of potential candidates for the post, but just that the seat is too hot at the moment.
But then the biggest blow came when Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar announcing the new cabinet line-up with the Communication and Digital Ministry being split into two ministries. Under the new formation, Communication will be under Fahmi Fadzil and Digital Ministry going back to former minister Gobind Singh Deo. However, the quandary is both Minister’s are clueless on which Ministry should DNB be placed under.
DNB’s Ongoing Saga
At one time the single most powerful telecommunication entity in the country assigned to roll out 5G for the whole country, DNB has been stripped of its Sigle Wholesale Network status, its equity split among mobile network operators while a second network developer has been approved. The Dual Wholesale Network model was approved by the Malaysian government after strong resistance by both the incumbent mobile network operators and professional bodies.
Now the country will have two big players who will offer 5G backbone to potential retailers be it mobile network operators or independent companies, one backed by the government while the other a pure commercial unit jointly operated by telco’s. Whether this will be effective is yet to be known as no full study been conducted by MCMC or has published any report on how these two units will function.
It is however known that the share sale agreements signed by the MNO’s with DNB stipulates that the national 5G service provider must complete 80% coverage of populated areas by end of 2023 of could see its license revoked, the operator has completed 76% as of mid December.
We are three days away from 2024, and could expect to hear an announcement from the government before that or the usual delay expected in the case of a limbo entity.
