| Type: | Private |
| Industry: | Telecommunications |
| Location: | 1 Kaki Bukit View, Techview, Singapore 415941 |
| Area Served: | Singapore |
| Key People: | David Teoh (Executive Chairman)[1] |
| Products: | Mobile Services Fibre Broadband |
| Revenue: | S$57.4 million (Sept 2022)[2] |
| Num Employees: | Approx. 100 |
SIMBA Telecom Pte Ltd, formerly known as TPG Singapore, is a Singaporean telecommunications company and one of four major telecommunication company operating in the country.
TPG Singapore was founded in 2016 by Australian businessman David Teoh after winning an auction from Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) for its airwaves rights. It was a subsidiary of TPG Telecom Australia, an Australian telecommunications company founded by Teoh.
In 2020, the merger of TPG Australia with Vodafone Hutchison Australia to form TPG Telecom resulted in TPG Singapore splitting up from its Australian counterpart. As a result, TPG Singapore operated under the newly established and Australian-listed Tuas Ltd, also founded by Teoh, independently of the merged TPG Telecom entity. In 2022, TPG Singapore was rebranded to SIMBA Telecom after the usage rights to TPG brand expired.
On 14 December 2016, it was announced that TPG had secured the fourth telecommunications license in Singapore for S$105 million (A$122 million).[3] The reserve price was only S$35 million, and TPG Singapore paid three times the minimum that was asked for by the Singapore authorities.[4] [5] [6]
They were provisionally allocated 60 MHz of spectrum made available in the New Entrant Spectrum Auction (NESA), with spectrum rights that commenced in April 2017. TPG was also expected to provide street level coverage nationwide within 18 months of the start date.[7]
On 21 December 2018, a call for 20,000 participants in a year-long trial was put out,[8] with another call for participants made in March 2019 while delaying the launch of the network to 2020.[9]
For voice communications, it makes use of Voice over LTE technology which saw subscribers have initial troubles setting up during the trial rollout at the start of 2019 as existing phones did not contain the configuration profile required for the VoLTE functionality to work.[10] These was largely resolved when the major brands added the configuration profile into their operating systems, with Apple adding the profile only in September 2019.[11]
In July 2019, a study by Opensignal found that TPG Singapore had slower network speeds and poorer connectivity than the established rival telcos.[12]
See also: TPG (Internet service provider). TPG launched commercial service in March 2020.[13]
Tuas Limited was incorporated in Australia on 11 March 2020 in anticipation of the demerger of the Singapore operations of TPG Telecom Limited (subsequently renamed to TPG Corporation Limited) resulting from the merger between TPG Telecom and Vodafone Hutchison Australia.[14] That merger attained final court approval on 26 June 2020 with the demerger of TPG Singapore becoming effective and under whose terms Tuas Limited has the rights to use the TPG brand in Singapore until June 2022.[15] [16]
In November 2021, Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) [17] [18] announced that the telco has won the rights to the 2.1 GHz spectrum of 5G network and services and is provisionally awarded[19] two lots of 5 MHz of the spectrum. With accordance to IMDA, TPG Singapore would have the right to provide 5G network services, starting 1 January 2022. As part of the regulatory process, TPG Singapore has to roll out the 5G network islandwide by the end of 2026.
In April 2022, TPG Singapore was rebranded to SIMBA Telecom after the end of its 2 years' usage rights to use the TPG brand.[20] [21]
In March 2023, it was announced that SIMBA will be entering the internet service provider (ISP) market in Singapore, offering the first 2.5Gbit/s broadband service. It will be leveraging the existing network infrastructure in Singapore.[22]
Simba has 819k subscribers as at June 2023.
| Band | Frequency | Frequency Width (MHz) | Protocol | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 (900 MHz) | (895~905; 940~950) | 2x10 | |||
| 1 (2100 MHz) | (1920~1930; 2110~2120) | 2x10 | |||
| 40 (2.3 GHz) | 2300~2340 | 40 | |||
| 38 (2600 MHz) | 2570~2580 | 10 |