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Monday, May 6, 2013
Saturday, May 4, 2013
Malaysian GE13: In sickness and in health?
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Meeting the people: Anwar addressing the crowd during a campaign in Malim Nawar, Kampar.
Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim is a very busy man these days, but the person who awaits him each time he comes home must be reason enough for the opposition leader to get up and keep on going the next day.
DATUK Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail jokes that she has now become a JP – Jaga Pintu.
No matter how late her husband Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim gets back from campaigning, she always makes sure she is the one to open the door for him.
“I just think of how much pahala (merit) I must be getting by waking up to let him in and that motivates me,” says the PKR president who has a full schedule herself during this run-up to the general election.
Last Wednesday, Anwar was in Bandar Baru Uda, Johor, then Batu Pahat before finishing in Segamat. His ceramah only ended after midnight.
After that, he stopped at a mamak stall with the PKR candidate for Segamat and former health minister Datuk Chua Jui Meng for a drink before heading back to Kuala Lumpur.
He only got home at 4am, grabbed some sleep, then it was off to the PKR headquarters at Merchant Square, Petaling Jaya, for a morning press conference before rushing off to Pahang for another round of ceramah.
Again, he got back to Kuala Lumpur in the wee hours of the morning – this time it was at 2am – but at the crack of dawn, he was up for prayers and off to the airport to catch a morning flight to Sarawak for another packed programme.
Then he was in Sabah for more of the same before heading back to Kuala Lumpur before dashing off to Penang, Putrajaya, Selangor, Negri Sembilan, Perak and Kedah for the final leg of campaigning.
Dr Wan Azizah says Anwar is good at pacing himself and getting power naps to re-energise so he can keep up with the gruelling pace.
Since the dissolution of Parliament, she says the PKR leader hasn’t had time to do his usual five-minute exercise on the bicycle.
“So, he does some stretches. And if (second daughter Nurul) Nuha’s one-year-old son, Sulaimaan, is around, he becomes Anwar’s ‘dumbell’.
“He loves it when Anwar lifts him up and down. So Anwar does that 10 to 15 times and that’s his upper arm exercise,” she laughs.
To maintain his health, Anwar has also started taking bird’s nest soup. “Because I know it’s made from birds’ saliva, I can’t drink it,” says Dr Wan Azizah with her usual no-airs charm.
On the campaign trail, Dr Wan Azizah and Anwar split up so they can cover more ground.
“We BBM or whatsapp each other a few times every day and talk at least once a day,” says Dr Wan Azizah.
Wherever he goes, crowds flock to hear Anwar speak.
“If Pakatan Rakyat wins the elections on May 5, we will be sworn in as the new government on May 6, and on May 7 we will bring petrol prices down,” Anwar says at almost every stop.
He promises that a Pakatan-run Federal Government will fully fund Chinese and Tamil schools in the country and abolish the PTPTN student loan scheme to make university education free.
As for the multi-billion ringgit Iskandar project in Gelang Patah, he says if Pakatan takes over the state, it will make sure there is participation of Johoreans in the project and that locals benefit from it – not just Singaporeans and outsiders.
Anwar also accuses Barisan of stealing Pakatan’s ideas in its Janji Ditepati manifesto such as the bringing down of import duty on cars.
Another star attraction at the Opposition leader’s ceramah is the PKR double-decker, 18-seater Jelajah Merdeka Rakyat bus.
“Whenever it stops, people crowd around to take photos and pose in front of the bus,” says Anwar’s press secretary Najwan Halimi, who is a mechanical engineering graduate with political aspirations himself.
“Sometimes if Anwar is in the bus and there is time to spare, he’ll get down and take pictures with the people.” Most of the time, though, Anwar is not on the bus.
Because he has to rush from place to place for the tight ceramah schedule and due to his back problem, Anwar usually moves around in a car and hops onto the bus the last two or three kilometres from the location.
“Sometimes party or division leaders would get on the bus to join the campaign and arrive at the venue together with Anwar,” says Najwan. “People love the bus because it is something different and special.”
Come May 5, voters will decide whether they opt for something different or stay with what’s comfortable and familiar.
ANALYSIS BY SHAHANAAZ HABIBRelated posts:
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Friday, May 3, 2013
IPTV market in Malaysia
The more the merrier in the IPTV market
Hopefully the battle gets fierce so that quality and content will improve to offer more choices to consumers.
IT has taken two companies - Astro and Maxis - within the same stable a long time to come out with their Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) offering.
The Maxis/Astro IPTV/broadband services were originally expected to be launched by end-2012 but were postponed to the end of the first quarter in 2013.
Astro and Maxis entered into partnership for IPTV/broadband collaboration in September 2012.
The good news is that both companies launched the Astro B.yond IPTV offering this week, riding on Telekom Malaysia Bhd's (TM) high speed broadband (HSBB) network.
Now there is another choice in the market place and Astro/Maxis will compete head-on with TM for market dominance in the IPTV segment. There are several other smaller players offering IPTV but not on the scale of these two.
A report said the continuous improvement on the speed of broadband and the availability of interactive applications would play a crucial role in the expansion of IPTV market around the globe.
Broadcasters and telecoms players globally have a new way to increase customer average revenue per user with the expansion of broadband and IPTV. The forecast is that the global IPTV market will rise to about US$106mil (RM323mil) in 2014. European countries are the biggest markets for IPTV, with France, the UK, and Germany leading the growth.
Asia is also responding strongly to this new phenomenon. This week, South Korea's SK Telecom saw its earnings rise, with its media business securing 600,000 paid subscribers for its mobile IPTV service in the first quarter. Astro claims to have a subscriber base of 3.5 million households representing 52% of Malaysia's total households of 6.7 million.
It is entrenched in the market place and TM's UniFi subscribers are readily accessible market for the Astro B.yond IPTV product as both are carried on the same HSBB network.
The caveat is that TM UniFi residential subscribers are locked in a two-year contract.
TM has to date activated more than 548,000 UniFi subscribers on the back of 1.39 million premises passed, covering 102 exchanges nationwide which translates to a 38% take-up rate. TM offers IPTV via HyppTV.
The choice is out there today, hopefully the battle gets fierce so that quality and content will improve to offer more choices to the consumers. As for pricing, it is still steep despite the value propositions and for a wider mass market appeal, the rates need a review.
And while Astro/Maxis claim they have a value proposition, TM may want to look to getting a bigger content library, and certainly, a cellular tie-up is recommended to counter the bundling that Astro/Maxis is offering.
Celcom Axiata is waiting on the sidelines. It also needs to get into the IPTV game and both TM/Axiata should begin talking seriously.
Friday Reflections - By B.K. Sidhu
Deputy news editor B.K. Sidhu is still thinking about how and when the digital cable TV operator will enter the fray.
Astro upgraded on IPTV potential
Target price: RM3.38
ASTRO Malaysia Holdings Bhd has finally launched its Astro B.yond Internet protocol TV (IPTV) with Maxis Bhd, which could complement its services to subscribers with more value proposition and significant savings.
Although the Maxis-Astro IPTV offering enjoys lower earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) margin compared to Time-Astro IPTV, synergistic benefits to be reaped from this collaboration should be more than enough to offset the shortfall.
It was reported that Astro Malaysia Holdings has officially launched its Astro B.yond IPTV with Maxis Bhd as an alternative for consumers to have access to home fibre broadband internet and home voice services.
On this Maxis-Astro IPTV offering, we understand that the fibre broadband packages provided by Maxis will range from 10Mbps to 30Mbps.
The B.yond IPTV content packages provided by Astro will be on SuperPack, Value Pack and Family Pack with prices ranging from RM37.95 to RM100 per month with an optional Home Voice Package of RM20 per month.
We understand that Astro will recognise 100% of the average revenue per user (ARPU) from this IPTV collaboration.
For instance, assuming customer A subscribes to the basic 10Mbps broadband package with a SuperPack1 content selection, the total ARPU will be RM248 per month (RM148 from the broadband package and RM100 from the content package) and Astro will recognise 100% of this total ARPU of RM248
Subsequently, in the cost of sales component, Astro will recognise 75% of the broadband ARPU (which is equivalent to RM111 in this case) as the cost to be distributed back to Maxis.
Based on our back-of-the-envelope calculation, the EBITDA margin of the Maxis-Astro IPTV collaboration will be circa 29% versus the circa 38% of the Time-Astro IPTV's EBITDA margin.
This implies that with a likely increasingly higher take-up for the Maxis-Astro IPTV offerings, the EBITDA margin of the group on the overall will be diluted on a percentage basis.
As this Maxis-Astro IPTV will be complemented by Maxis' extensive reach of 1.3 million homes compared to Time's reach of 100,000 homes, we believe that it could immediately give a boost to its revenue.
This should increase its absolute profit despite the EBITDA margin dilution should the product be well taken up.
We also understand that 1.1 million (or 85%) of the current high-speed broadband (HSBB) home premises are on Astro's subscribership.
That said, for current Astro subscribers who are also having the TM Unifi package, they could achieve better value propositions and cost savings by subscribing to this new IPTV packages.
We are sanguine on this collaboration as it has bundles of win-win benefits for the subscribers and synergistic benefits for Astro and Maxis.
In conjunction with that, we are assuming circa 65,000 and circa 175,000 subscribers to take up this IPTV offering (mainly on SuperPack packages), taking cues from the management's guidance of circa 60,000 to 70,000 and 170,000 to 180,000 subscribers in 2014 and 2015 respectively.
Consequently, our net profit has been increased by 2.4% to 9.9% in 2014 and 2015 despite a lower EBITDA margin of 32.4% (from 32.7%) and 33.4% (from 34.2%) for the two years.
Consequently, our DCF-derived target price has now been increased to RM3.38 from RM3.10.
As the target price offers a decent capital upside of circa 15%, we are upgrading our “market perform” call on Astro to an “outperform.”
By Kenanga Research
Related post:
Which player can steal more eyeballs in pay-TV market?
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