Saudi Telecom to pursue 5G, to develop local HR skills

Corporate communications General ManagerAmjad Shacker.

BARCELONA: Saudi Telecom Co. (STC) inked five memorandums of understanding (MoUs) with various telecommunication companies on the sidelines of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) for 5G technology and to develop its human resources.
STC is the largest mobile service provider in Saudi Arabia, with more than 20 million subscribers in the Kingdom.
Speaking to Arab News at the MWC, Amjad Shacker, general manager for corporate communications, said it is time for the company to be in line with the upcoming G5 technology, which would help promote the Saudi Vision 2030 and the National Transformation Plan (NTP) 2020.
Shacker said the STC pavilion at the MWC has both hospitality and network stands to give the visitors a good picture of the Kingdom and its tourist attractions; and to show them the STC achievements in terms of its contributions to the mobile industry in the Kingdom.
The hospitality stands, he said, showed a documentary on Saudi Arabia to highlight touristic features that are relatively unknown globally.
He said the documentary “this is Saudi Arabia” was being screened so that the world could know more about the the Kingdom.
The theme of the pavilion is “Network Leap,” which is aimed at demonstrating STC; contribution to the country’s communications industry, he pointed out.
The theme of the STC program, he said, is to leap into the future with a network to redesign systems offering better services to the customers.
This will pave the way for faster communication to offer the best services for the customers whose experiences will be enriched, he noted.
Shacker said: “We are also looking for investors for digital innovation and this is one of STC extensions of its investment program when it invested in (car-hailing service) Careem.
“We want to do more investment in digital innovation since we are interested in diversifying our portfolio to keep abreast of the developments,” he stressed.
Shacker said that the company signed agreements with Huawei, Nokia, Cisco, Ericcson and Juniper to keep pace with the 5G technology and to enable the local human resources to update their skills to tailor themselves according to future needs.
Under one agreement, he said, Cisco will support the telecom service provider to meet customer demands. The transformation of STC’s network aligns with Saudi Arabia’s National Transformation and the country’s digitization acceleration plans announced between the government and Cisco last year, which aims to support the Kingdom’s digital economy ambitions.
“We operate in a constantly evolving industry in the Kingdom with a need to continuously improve our operational service and customer satisfaction, as well as reduce operational expenditure.”
The MoU with Ericsson is to collaborate on the development of 5G network technologies and services. Together with other technology leaders, Ericsson will outline the road toward 5G through joint market-leading trials of advanced technologies, incorporating network tests on “Very High Speed,” “Ultra Low Latency” and a “highly reliable extreme capacity broadband network.”
STC has already successfully carried out unique 5G experiments and Lab tests, moving toward the successful deployment of the much anticipated 5G mobile services, he said.
These tests have set a new record in the speed of mobile data services, which no doubt will lead to a new revolution in mobile network applications and services.