How Maxis is breaking through by changing consumer behaviour.
With people spending more hours binge-watching shows, coupled with the availability of a long list of digital services today, there is a growing demand for higher bandwidth and seamless connectivity.
WHILE the advent of digitalisation has changed consumer behaviour tremendously over the years, the pandemic has accelerated this shift further, especially with the transition to hybrid working and learning, and people consuming entertainment from home.
There is a huge dependency to be connected in every way possible, whether at home or on-the-go. These shifts have also accelerated activities like peer-to-peer videos and downloads, on-demand entertainment, gaming and instant messaging – with streaming and web browsing becoming the most widely used activities.
In fact, video streaming makes up the bulk of Maxis’ total network traffic, followed by browsing, social networking, instant messaging, VoIP, games and shopping.
These applications, particularly for video, are also now more sophisticated with 4K resolution becoming the norm, while devices are getting smarter with usage of multiple apps at a time.
“In the past two and half years, digital adoption by Malaysians in many ways – from the way we shop to how businesses equip themselves with digital capabilities and channels to reach more customers.
“We’ve also seen how quickly different sectors have moved into a hybrid mode of working and learning from home and on site,” says Maxis chief marketing officer Loh Keh Jiat.
For Maxis, convergence of mobile and home services is key and its fibre propositions are playing a significant role in meeting the ever-growing demands of great connectivity experience at home.
Maxis’ fibre offerings go as far back as a decade. Following the implementation of the Mandatory Standard on Access Pricing back in 2018, the industry had the opportunity to offer more choices at competitive prices to consumers and businesses.
Maxis led the market in new affordable home and business fibre broadband plans through its Fibrenation campaign with packages up to 65% cheaper than what they had previously offered.
“Today, the demands for Internet consumption have grown tremendously, and our focus has been on providing higher speeds and with greater affordability,” says Loh.
“This is why we started offering 300Mbps up to 800Mbps even before the pandemic and today we are proud to have the widest fibre footprint which is a result of our own fibre infrastructure and wholesale partnerships.”
Fixed broadband is best
‘Fibre is the best connectivity for the home. For customers in locations that do not have fibre coverage, they can still enjoy connectivity via wireless broadband,’ says Loh.
At the of end 2021, the fixed broadband segment remained relatively untapped with 65% of homes fiberised and less than 55% of those fiberised homes connected.
“We believe there is a great future for fixed broadband in Malaysia, with significant growth potential in this untapped market,” says Loh.
“Fibre is the best for connectivity for the home. For customers in locations that do not have fibre coverage, they can still enjoy connectivity via wireless broadband. For example, with Maxis Home 4G WiFi, customers will be on our 4G network whereby they will be able to enjoy unlimited data for all services from work, learn and play.
“They can also get unlimited data for all lines for the whole family by combining any of their mobile lines with the plan. With a ‘plug and play’ easy setup, customers will be able to connect instantly, with no installation required, and use multiple devices at once – all with the option to add on home devices with zero upfront on our easy device ownership programme, Zerolution,” he shares.
In addition to its own fibre build, Maxis serves over five million premises. Moreover, Maxis continues to evaluate the possibility of more partnerships with infrastructure builders and owners, assisting with the government’s National Digital Network Plan (Jendela) plan and addressing how 4G can help accelerate broadband availability in homes where fibre infrastructure is not yet available.
“More and more of our customers are enjoying fibre connectivity and this is evident in the consistent growth of our fibre connections quarter on quarter.
“As of Q2 2022, we have 638,000 fibre and 4G wireless home broadband connections nationwide due to strong adoption of our converged packages and wider deployment to underserved areas.
“Meanwhile, we continue to expand our broadband footprint to secondary towns, via both fibre and 4G, to bring connectivity to even more Malaysians,” says Loh.
Twice as much traffic
Maxis’ consistent growth in home connections is driven by strong traction of Maxis Unlimited Postpaid and Fibre, whereby customers on Maxis Fibre have unlimited data on their postpaid lines.
“We continue to see very strong year-on-year growth in data usage and recorded all-time high utilisation of our converged network of mobile and fibre connectivity.
“What’s interesting is that our fibre network now carries almost twice as much traffic than the mobile network.
“We believe this is closely linked to the shift in customer behaviour as mentioned and the expectation of service providers to offer more than just either mobile or fixed,” says Loh.
Head of Maxis Consumer Arjun Varma says that product innovation has been central to Maxis’ efforts to offer an unmatched personalised experience for its customers.
Product innovation has been central to Maxis’ efforts to offer an unmatched personalised experience for its customers, says Arjun.
“We owe this to our sharp focus on innovation around services and home experience propositions, as well as a deep understanding of changing customer behaviour and needs.
“This has essentially translated into a simplified journey for our customers. For example, we make it very easy for customers to own their favourite home devices with initiatives such our successful Zerolution programme,” says Arjun.
These have resulted in plans catered to very specific segments, such as the Maxis Family Plan which addresses everyday needs such as data, home Internet or accessibility to new devices.
“These propositions have helped us stay relevant in the market. Our propositions are also built with our Rangkaian Kita, Rangkaian Malaysia premise in mind to better cater to Malaysians from all walks of life based on their diverse and unique requirements.
“Another differentiating factor is our fibre service through our dedicated Internet experts, 'Maxperts', who not only install routers but ensure that the WiFi is optimised for the best connectivity experience at home.
“We have dedicated staff, physically, over the phone and online serving with our expertise, complemented with AI-powered chatbots to serve customers 24/7,” says Arjun.
Fibre expansion plans
For Maxis, convergence of mobile and home services is key and its fibre propositions are playing a significant role in meeting the ever-growing demands of great connectivity experience at home.
Loh says that Maxis has ambitions to expand its fibre footprint to bring affordable and high-speed connectivity to all home and business premises in Malaysia by building its own fibre and collaborating with access providers in the market.
“For our own fibre build, we will have approximately 400,000 premises passes to be rolled out over the next 12 to 18 months as part of Jendela, including tier two and tier three areas, which will bring high speed broadband access to families living in non-urban areas in Selangor, Kuala Lumpur, Perlis, Kedah, Penang, Perak, Negeri Sembilan, Melaka, Johor as well as east coast regions Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang.
“We also build fibre networks for enterprises and offer a wide range of business fibre connectivity solutions for a truly converged experience.
“There is a promising future for fibre, as both residential customers and businesses rely heavily on communications, video conferencing and video streaming. For Maxis, we are already playing a key role as a digitalisation catalyst for individuals, businesses and the nation through our connectivity and digital solutions.
“With our all-ways connected proposition, we are committed to bringing together the best of technologies to enable people, businesses and the nation to always be ahead in a changing world,” says Loh.
For more information or to sign up for Maxis Fibre, click here.
