Taiwan Mobile will expand its business deployments in Southeast Asia through cooperation with partners in e-commerce, digital ads, gaming and other services, as part of its efforts to implement its "super 5G" strategy - "Gift," "Group," "Grit," "Green" and "GSEA" (Greater Southeast Asia), according to company president Jamie Lin.

Lin said Southeast Asia has witnessed rapid development of digital economy with a market scale estimated to top US$300 billion by 2025, apart from having generated startup unicorns including Grab, Gojek and Lazada, providing many opportunities for Taiwan Mobile to explore innovative mobile services.

Taiwan Mobile will continue business integration with its affiliated media platform Krbo Media, e-commerce brand Momo, Appworks and Fubon financial services, Lin said, adding that Momo is carrying out some cooperation projects in Southeast Asia and will strengthen its expansion momentum there in 2021.

Lin said that Taiwan Mobile will also solicit more international talent in domains including digitalization, social media, e-commerce and FinTech to facilitate the integration efforts and business expansion in Southeast Asia.

The telecom carrier now has around 580,000 5G users, the highest number of its kind in Taiwan, and will continue to optimize its 5G mobile network coverage and transmission capacity. It is slated to complete installation of 6,000 5G base stations by the end of 2021, with 5G network coverage to rise to 80% as a result, according to Lin.

He also disclosed that Taiwan Mobile is in talks with over 20 enterprise clients about the establishment of 5G private networks, but it will take 3-6 years for the new business to start contributing revenues.