An analysis of SingTel Current Operations and New Product Launch

Asia’s single leading communications group SingTel, headquartered in Singapore have its investments and operations in more than 20 territories and countries. The solution and service by the group is provided in fixed, data and mobile communications, information technology, internet, pay television, consultancy and satellite. The company has experience more than 140 years and in country’s development played a pivotal role as a major communication hub. Their subsidiary in Australia named Opus is integrated leader in telecommunications constantly increasing the innovative bar in services and products (Baillie et al. 2020). Strategic investments have been done in leading companies in Africa, Asia including Bharti Airtel (south Asia, India), Globe Telecom (Philippines), Telkomsel (Indonesia) and in Thailand the ‘Advanced Info Service’. One of the largest listed companies in Singapore is SingTel on the Singapore Exchange by capitalisation of the market. Throughout US, Europe and Asia Pacific, there is vast network by the group and more than twenty thousand staffs are employed worldwide.

1. Current operations: the leading services by the industry have been complemented by the interconnection of network, secure data centres where there is hosting by the enterprises clouds. For the past few years, there has been attracting of major several providers of cloud, financial services and customers of technology requiring well connected, resilient and scalable centres for data in hosting their platforms of clouds. The acceleration in their efforts of helping enterprises in digitalisation would be boosted with the upcoming arrival of 5G, promising in advanced power technologies like AI, virtual or augmented reality. Partnering with Singapore and Australia in equipment, technology and solution providers so as to create stakeholders ecosystems could collaborate in developing potential solutions and use cases.
2. New launching of product: there has been an agreement between Nokia and SingTel in collaborating on trialling and developing 5G network capabilities of slicing, based on an approach of Network as a Service (NaaS) through which customers are provided customisable services of high amount for 5G variety use applications and cases. The key 5G feature has been network slicing where virtual multiple networks could be atop created one physical network. In a series of trials this has been the latest that SingTel and its partners in technology have been working to develop use cases of 5G in areas such as manufacturing, maritime operations and cloud gaming. The platform for NaaS enabled by next generation of Nokia’s operations cloud and suite management products through which creation is automated and digital services have been delivered giving SingTel greater visibility and control across network besides specific 5G needs addressing of enterprises with flexibility, speed and efficiency. For instance an enterprise would be offered by SingTel as slicing of secured network on demand, in minutes matter along with security assured and performance of network in latency, availability and bandwidth. Such networks if also launched would take months in implementing effectively.
3. The new product might be viable due to the deploying of 3,5Hz, 5G prime frequency, the trial for three month giving SingTel customers an ultra-fast, early taste mobile benefits and speed associated with 5G besides accessing rich services for contents such as games or movies on their devices (Kalem et al. 2020).

SWOT Analysis of SingTel

The major competitors of SingTel are Star-Hub, Mobile 1, Telstra, Vodafone and TBJ Telecom Ltd. And the recent mergers have been with Turn.Inc, NTU Singapore & A*STAR AND Mobile. The proven management framework, SWOT Analysis enables the brand in bench marking its performance and business as compared to the industry and competitors.

Strength: with the upcoming of the 5G connectivity, the company have been continuing to enhance and strengthen the resiliency of the infrastructure and network so as to cater for new technologies that would rely on high bandwidth connectivity and low latency. The construction have been completed in the INDIGO central submarine cable systems and INDIGO West linking Sydney in Australia and Southeast Asia to Perth. The network has also been expanded in the Southern Hemisphere with Southern Cross Next construction in Australia, United State and New Zealand. So there exists operational efficiency and timely upgrades(Devanesan, 2020).

Weakness: as the launching would be atrial round, full experience of 5G may not be just available. The implementation of high band 5G would require some major changes. The travelling of the 5G signals within the high band spectrum have short ranges and might be difficult penetrating windows, walls or any hard surfaces. Significant investments in infrastructure should be undertaken by the network service providers (Al-Absi et al. 2020).

Opportunities: the customer experience would be redefined by the setup of the 5G network by bringing new opportunities by innovating all customer touch points to post sale support from marketing. Across the world as the rollouts of 5G begins, business has been faced by customers specially those in retail and hospitality sector and for opportunities, the new communication technology in enhancing the engagement of customers has been set apart from the laggards.

Threats: the home regions have saturated markets and in case of subsidiaries there has been stringent regulations. With the evolution of 5G ideas, competitors are posing threats. With the growing frequency of cyber threats and sophistication the company’s capabilities have been reinforced by the launch of the Trust ware Fusion Platform that functions as the “mobile security operations centre’, providing real time insights to the enterprises on their security status . Such systems are instilled with threat intelligence causing to respond rapidly towards potential threats and the attacker’s window of opportunity would be reduced minimising the cause of damage.

Strengths and Weaknesses of SingTel Competitors

Two major competitors are faced by SingTel in the telecom market that are M1 and Star Hub. Both have been supported by the worldwide experienced telecom operators and strong local partners additionally. The best competitive threat to SingTel has been no doubted posed by Star Hub. There have been no extra edges in matching the two brands for launching any similar kind of product. On the other hand M1 has less capacity in competing with SingTel. So SingTel need not go for tried and tested technologies that might not furnish the company with a sustainable competitive edge. Rather, collaboration with agencies, innovators, R&D associations and equity providers would lead to recognising and investing in new services and integrating them with the 5G telecom services.

PESTLE Analysis of SingTel

One of the best tools is the PESTLE analysis through which it can be utilised by the analysers of the markets for monitoring and analysing the environment macro factors that impacts as well as influences the organisation (Helmold, 2019).

a)Political factors: beyond the organisation the holding of the Singapore Government has a positive impact on the launching of the new 5G services. The majority forces of the organisation have been owned by Temasek Holdings as it is one of the Singapore government’s investment wings. With the help of capitalization of the market, SingTel in the Singapore exchange has a total portfolio of over 200 billion dollars. The investment and disinvestment decisions in matters of launching the 5 trial programme would be influenced by the constitution, laws of Singapore as well as the shareholder of TEmasek and Minister of Finance. With the backing of the Singapore government, the investors would have confidence for maximizing and investing the credibility of the company.

1. Economic: with the Covid-19 pandemic that has caused havoc, SingTel in order to keep the operations going have resorted working remotely like other companies as a part of social distancing measure and has proved to be friendly in times of economic downturn. Flexible internet connections are provided along with the launching of mobile service plans with the 5G mode allowing enterprises in collaborating and communicating securely. Therefore on the market or consumers, growth is basically dependent. The experience by the customers would be showcased from their home comfort via the virtual tour(Frue, 2020).
2. Social: the priority by SingTel is to get 5G off the ground besides integrating with it AI in delivering services to the next generation. Service delivery has been accelerated in improving experiences of the end user and reducing the operational and infrastructural costs in delivering service applications. With low scalability and latency, driving efficiencies by the enterprises could only be via the cost effective decisions.
3. Technological: the platform for multi access edge computing (MEC) is being used integrating the high bandwidth capabilities and ultra-low latency techniques with performance for powerful cloud computing, with processing of rich graphics on dedicated severs and direct transferring to devices, significantly lowering the lag times. A less risky route to 5G would be ensured by non-standalone 5G (5G NSA). BOTH 5G and 4G capabilities would be blended besides offering services differently in enhancing the customer experiences. The existing LTE base stations and core networks would quickly deploy the 5G and there would be no requirement for completely overhauling new hardware’s with entire network. 5G commercialisation would be accelerated with quick monetisation and fast on boarding opportunities.
4. Legal: the legislation issues would obviously impact the launching of the 5G reform. The issues would mainly include the customers, monopolies and the government. There might exist online fury with overcharging on free apps.
5. Environmental: the radiations from the 5G waves would have an ill impact on the biodiversity. So, business needs to find strategies for impacting the climate change and carbon footprint needs to be mitigated in implementing green networks.

Marketing strategy Considering Target, Segmentation and Positioning

1. a) A long term, forward looking approach is defined as the marketing strategy and any organisations overall game plan or fundamental goal of any business in sustainable competitive achievement by understanding the customers wants and needs.
2. b) The marketing strategy importance in a marketing plan helps the business in creating services and products with great chances of profit maximisation. This is due to the start of marketing strategy with research in marketplace taking into consideration the competition and the optimal target customer and the trends that lays in the horizonKwarso, (2017).

Segmentation:The identification of niches with detailed needs, new customers found in mature markets and delivering more effective and focused marketing messages. For each segment the marketing messages needs to be designed and for all types of customers the features needs to match (Camilleri, 2018).

For SingTel segmentation is being done as:

• Demographic: maximum population caters to up gradation of technology for faster results. 5G has evolved targeting first the younger generation and then moving onto the healthcare, retail or manufacturing sector.
• Psychographics: the emotions and personality are based on the behaviour, linking to the personal choices consisting of lifestyles, attitudes, personality, leadership traits, etc. of the products bought. This is similar to the evolution of technology. The feedbacks, surveys and customer data reveal the demand at the present time.
• Behaviour: the brand loyalty, purchase, benefits sought, usage level etc. all determines the next move to be taken by SingTel.

Target:For each segment, there needs to be evaluation of commercial and potential attractiveness in terms of: criteria size where the company justifies in terms of segmenting (Schlegelmilch, 2016). If market is found smaller, then 5G network would not be attractive. Secondly, between each segment there must exist difference in techniques and thirdly how much anticipated profits might exceed cost and change 5G plans needs to be measured.

Differentiation: in particular differentiation implies branding of the product. In an increasing market for global competitiveness, the business and product improvements are constantly happening and competitor’s price could be easily matched (OeKulet, Wanyoike, &Koima, 2019).. So there needs to be critical differentiation of brands. It is therefore highly recommended to aware the potential customers in the market as much as possible using different advertisement techniques.

Positioning:this is the last strategies element for making the product of the company to stand in a market. Positioning is important for effective branding of the product (Gonchar,Gorokhova&Ponomarenko, 2019). In this case if the strategies that have been planned by SingTel in launching of the 5G Programme needs to get acquainted with the customers or into the sectors, otherwise all efforts would go in vain. The table below representing positioning of SingTel in the market among its competitors(www.ibscdc.org, 2020).

Analysis of SingTel using Four P’s of Marketing

Product:the product mix strategy in launching its 5G products can be explained as follows:

The starting of SingTel was as the provider of fixed line telephone service but as years passed the company has been bringing about diversification in marketing mix service and product base. In recent times, the offers and services that the brand has been providing are broadband plans, Wi-Fi and upcoming services of 5G both pre-paid and post-paid. Besides the high speed network there has been internet based TV connection, fibre broadband, on demand services of videos. The company has been providing services for lifestyles like SingTel newsstands, music, smart home, surf school, etc. the diversification of the company’s product leading to 5G have showcased the transformation of everyday events into 5G UNBOXED immersive experiences. The family could now avail for any 5G applications, the features of the showcase are the robot ambassadors for the next generation.

1. Price: the SingTel provision of services prices are dependent on the product type a customer might be opting for. With the launching of the 5G trial programme the company has thought of huge sign ups platforms and providing trial for three months and after that market trial would be redeemed fully. Further the market trail might be enjoyed fully by the SingTel 5G NOW enjoyment. Besides, this additional local data of 10 GB both across 4G and 5G networks would be provided. On top of that existing data bundle the extra 10 GB data would be added. Such features have made the product price effective.
2. Place: the central business district of Singapore covers the 5G network including areas such as Orchard, Pagar, etc. where customers mostly use the data service. In many other countries the trial of 5G is targeted to reach along with the brand subsidiaries. Besides the seamless, hyper realistic experience of mobile cloud gaming, it has also been targeted to include in the manufactures and logistics in detecting the defects via the use of AI robots and video cameras, in healthcare’s with 3D headsets and in smart buildings for monitoring the real time consumption of power.
3. Promotion: Being the leader, both traditional methods like print, newspaper or billboards and modern digital media methods are being used. Technological giants have tied up with the company such as Apple, Google, and Microsoft in further raising the brand equity. Besides the SingTel app would provide most of the information and through sponsorship event the visibility would also be raised.

Conclusion

From the report it can be concluded that the evolution of 5G has been that of being a game changer, promising in enabling and transforming smart cities and life’s. The accelerated digitalisation post COVID led to ultra-fast speeds, low latency and reliability in connecting almost every spheres and at an unprecedented scale innovation have been driven in unlocking value immensely for enterprises and customers alike. SingTel has thereby enabled the new era of 5G that needs to see the technology advancement and building an ecosystem with innovative capabilities and required infrastructure.