We just might be getting faster mobile internet very soon, and the Philippines will no longer be notorious for its slow internet. Hooray for the ever-growing number of Filipino mobile internet users.

In acquiring 50% of San Miguel Corporation’s telecommunications business, Globe Telecom now has an additional spectrum, specifically 700MHz of frequency. Below are some infographics that will help you understand better what this all means and how this benefits us, mobile subscribers:

“We entered into this transaction as a solution to harmonize the spectrum assets in the country and immediately unlock the benefits of the underutilized frequencies. Ultimately, our goal is to provide our customers with a better experience on our mobile data and home broadband services progressively over the next twelve months,” said Ernest L. Cu, President and Chief Executive Officer of Globe. “The additional frequencies will provide the much needed capacity to improve mobile browsing speeds that our customers would enjoy.”

Apprently, Philippine telcos are having difficulty improving the quality of mobile data services because of continued challenges with site acquisition for cell sites and the intensely bureaucratic permitting process of many local government units. At present, it takes about 25 permits spanning a period of eight months to get an approval to build one cell site. This results to a relatively low number of cell sites serving the growing base of mobile data users.

The company is set to deploy fiber optic cables in 20,000 barangays all over the country to provide faster and more reliable internet access in about 2M homes nationwide. The infrastructure build is expected to take five years and will extend network coverage to more areas that currently have no connection or spotty service.

Finally, our mobile internet speed can catch up with our country’s progress.

Infographics courtesy of the Globe Telecom Facebook page