THERE is a huge disparity among five Philippine cities in terms of mobile broadband speeds and it comes as no surprise that Manila gained the top spot in a crowdsourced list.
Data from mobile analytics firm Opensignal revealed that mobile data Internet users in Manila enjoyed much faster download and upload speeds than their counterparts in Angeles, Cebu, Davao and Cagayan de Oro.
On the average, Manila had 81-percent faster average speed than Cagayan de Oro, a 73-percent margin versus Cebu and Davao, and a 47-percent difference from Angeles.
In terms of download speed experience, the Philippine capital clocked in 11.6 Mbps, with Angeles trailing behind at 7.9 Mbps, Davao at 6.7 Mbps, Cebu at 6.6 Mbps, and Cagayan de Oro at 6.4 Mbps.
“The Manila metro area is by far the largest urban zone in Manila, and we expect speeds to be faster in cities than in the country as a whole. But in this case, one city in the Philippines is much faster than the rest—and the differences in speed are quite large,” the Opensignal report read.
Manila also posted the fastest average upload speed in the Philippines at 3.4 Mbps. Angeles came in second at 2.7 Mbps, Cebu at 2.5 Mbps, Davao at 2.4 Mbps, and Cagayan de Oro, 2.3 Mbps.
“In upload speed experience the distance between Manila and the other cities wasn’t quite as large, but it was still significant. Our users in Manila experienced overall upload speeds of 3.4 Mbps, which was 26 percent higher than the average Upload Speed Experience in Angeles and at least 36 percent higher than the average for Cebu, Davao, and Cagayan de Oro,” the report read.
While these results paint a picture of how operators have been focusing their resources in Manila over the past few years, this prioritization comes at no surprise to Opensignal.
“Operators typically focus their infrastructure and capacity upgrades in a country’s largest cities as it allows them to target a large portion of their potential customer base in relatively compact areas,” the report read.
It also cited that the populace in capital cities are often “wealthy and tech-savvy,” which “make excellent candidates” for new products and services.
‘Not just network resources’
But for Smart Communications Inc. Spokesman Ramon R. Isberto, the speed imbalance between Manila and the other cities in the Philippines is also due to the fact that people living in the capital have better handsets than those in other areas.
“One of the reasons for the difference of speeds is not just the network resources available in the cities, but also the handsets,” he explained to the BusinessMirror. “We have customers in Manila with handsets capable of carrier aggregation.”
Carrier aggregation pertains to the ability of a mobile device to mix different frequencies together to sport faster speeds. It could combine two frequency bands (2CC), three frequency bands (3CC), four frequency bands (4CC), or even five frequency bands (5CC).
Isberto further explained that while Smart has adopted a “default policy” of enabling carrier aggregation in its base stations equipped with LTE, without the handset capability users cannot achieve speeds like that of Manila.
“The key there really is having the right handsets,” he said.
Smart is gearing up to enable all of its base stations with carrier aggregation technology by year-end. Currently, it is at around 80 percent to target, Isberto said.
Officials of Globe Telecom Inc. have yet to reply to the BusinessMirror’s queries as of writing time.
Striking a balance
Opensignal cautioned operators, however, to strike a better balance in the development of their infrastructure in other cities and provinces.
“Manila isn’t just the population center of the Philippines, it’s the cultural, economic and political hub as well. But Angeles, Cagayan de Oro, Cebu and Davao are hardly small towns,” the report read.
The four cities surveyed, it said, are “important regional business hubs and many of them serve as the administrative centers of their regions.”
It seems that the telcos are proactively building network resources outside of Manila.
The two companies, Globe and Smart, have so far signed several contracts with tower operators to build shared telco infrastructure in other areas, such as Cebu, Davao, Olongapo and Calabarzon.
For now, until those towers are set up, the speed gap between Manila and other cities may continue to persist, and this will set the capital apart from its neighboring Philippine cities.
“The Philippines clearly has two tiers of speed when it comes to urban areas: there’s Manila and there’s everyone else,” the Opensignal report read.
Image credits: Michael Wels | Dreamstime.com