KUALA LUMPUR, July 3 — Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) is revising its revenue growth to flat or negative 1 per cent this year from 3.5 to 4 per cent as set previously in Feb due to persistent market headwinds in the telecommunication industry.

TM Acting Group Chief Executive Officer Datuk Bazlan Osman said the group faces numerous challenges such as intensifying competition, increasing business and operating costs, cautious enterprise spending and increasing regulatory pressures.

"At the same time, we are also revising our capital expenditure (capex) guidance for this year between 20 to 22 per cent of revenue, from the high 20 per cent guided earlier this year,” he said during the group’s media briefing today.

He said this entails reprioritsing its network spending and sweating of existing assets.

"In regard to expanding our coverage, we will do so in the most efficient manner,” he said.

In response to the government’s national broadband aspiration, he said TM will be introducing its new broadband and mobile plans to boost its position in the market.

"We will be introducing a new affordable entry level Unifi package at 30Mbps for targeted B40 segment.

"Lower income groups can access high-speed broadband through this package at a price point below RM100 (more than 40 per cent lower price from the existing 30Mbps package) and registration for pre-booking starts July 15.”

The other plan is Unifi 'turbo', which offers more than double the current broadband speed, he said.  

"TM will gradually upgrade the speed for all our existing Unifi customers at more than double the speed at no extra cost starting August 15, while new customers subscribing to existing Unifi plans before December 31, will also be upgraded accordingly in 2019.”

Subscribers can check their eligibility for the upgrade via unifi.com.my from 15 July.

The government had announced last month that broadband subscription rates could be reduced by 25 per cent by year-end pursuant to the implementation of the Mandatory Standard Access Pricing (MSAP).