MANILA – PLDT remains to have the largest fiber network infrastructure in the country, spanning 395,000 kilometers (km) as of the end of September, and improved its network capacity to 55 terabits per second (Tb/s).
In a statement on Wednesday, PLDT said its fiber network is the “most extensive and advanced digital transport network in the country” and supports all of its internet delivery platforms such as fiber fixed broadband, mobile data services via 4G and 5G, and carrier-grade Wi-Fi.
Aside from giving more households access to its fiber network, PLDT has also increased its “backbone network capacity” to 55 Tb/s, with plans to further increase this by another 37 Tb/s.
“This capacity expansion aims to serve customers’ growing demand for data and deliver technologies like 5G, LTE, and fiber-to-the-home,” PLDT said.
Mario Tamayo, PLDT-Smart senior vice president for network planning and engineering, noted that the company’s network expansion is still ongoing despite challenges brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Expansion works are ongoing to extend PLDT’s footprint by another 81,000 km, 31,000 km more in 2020 and 50,000 in 2021,” Tamayo said.
He noted that the expansion of PLDT’s fiber network also supports its mobile subsidiary Smart’s network by providing “high-capacity links” for its base stations.
“From the base station all the way to the data centers, the connection is mostly fiber. Faster transmission of data is best enabled by fiberizing the base stations, so our customers can have a better experience when streaming videos, for instance,” Tamayo said.
He added that PLDT and Smart will continue to expand and upgrade their entire network which currently consists of thousands of cell sites, 56,799 base stations, 3.81 million ports for outside plan facilities, 25 core data centers, three cable landing stations, and international gateway facilities.
Over the past five years, PLDT said its capital expenditure (capex) has reached PHP260 billion—mostly poured into its network build-out.
It noted that its capex was particularly high in the last two years—38 percent in 2018 and 45 percent in 2019. (PNA)
