The Philippines’ newest telecommunications player, DITO Telecommunity just officially turned one (01) this month and has hit their 7-million subscriber milestone.
“We are pleased to inform our countrymen that DITO has hit another milestone in our journey. As of March 14, close to a week after our first anniversary, we have hit 7-million active subscribers. We wish to express our gratitude to all those who have placed their trust in DITO and assure everyone of our continued efforts to provide world class connectivity to Filipinos wherever they may be,” according to Atty. Adel Tamano, Chief Administrative Officer of DITO Telecommunity.
Over the last year, DITO has emerged to disrupt the duopoly in the local telecommunications market. The launch of new breakthrough features DITO Auto Pay and DITO Advance Pay represent the telco’s latest innovations as it enters its second year of operations — the first of many more innovations to come.
“We’re leveling up the customer experience by introducing new breakthrough features such as DITO Auto Pay and DITO Advance Pay — a first in the Philippines’ mobile industry; and we’re excited to showcase all these to our DITOzens as we start our second year of operations in the country,” said DITO Chief Commercial Officer Evelyn Jimenez noting that the new features are DITO’s response to the ever-present need of Filipinos to have simple offers that give the best value for money, are hassle-free to acquire, and will elevate subscribers’ experience.
DITO is Open RAN Ready Since Day 1
During the media Q&A at DITO Telecommunity’s Anniversary Press Conference last 08 March 2022 at Grand Hyatt Manila in BGC, I took the opportunity to ask Rodolfo “Gen Boy” Santiago, the telco’s Chief Technology Officer (CTO) about their take on Open RAN (open radio access network).
“We built our IT system from the ground up with high automation. We may be late, but in terms of business and operations support systems required for a telco, from the very start these are integrated into DITO. Our competitors until today are struggling to integrate all of their systems. From the very start, the design of our system is ready for Open RAN. We already have plans to roll out and discussed with partners the use of Open RAN equipment. But the technology (Open RAN) was not yet matured when we started planning our system,” according to Gen Boy.
Open RAN refers to the use of industry standards in designing radio-access equipment used for telecom cellular networks and plays an important role in the buildout of 5G infrastructure.