KUCHING: Maxis Bhd (Maxis) appears to be making progress on mobile content in keeping with its ambition to evolve into an integrated service provider.

WIRELESS POPULATION: According to Maxis, the potential and demand for mobile content was big given Malaysia’s young population whereby about 50 per cent is less than 25 years old in which most of them used the Internet daily through their mobile phones.

According to ECM Libra Capital Sdn Bhd (ECM Libra), Maxis had launched some useful applications, in partnership with content providers and application designers such as the Fifa World Cup 2010 application Finder301 was an application which enabled users to share reviews, ratings and details of places of interest such as restaurants while Maxis Movies showed what was playing at various cinemas.

“The Fifa World Cup 2010 and Maxis Movies applications have been quite successful given the strong popularity among the top 50 free applications available in iTunes,” said an analyst from ECM Libra.

The research house said by encouraging the development of attractive mobile content, it believed Maxis aimed to achieve more data traffic on its networks and generate additional non-voice revenue as a means to achieve high single digit revenue growth.

“Maxis is targeting non-voice revenue to make up 50 per cent of their total revenue in 2012,” highlighted the analyst.

According to Maxis, the potential and demand for mobile content was big given Malaysia’s young population whereby about 50 per cent was less than 25 years old in which most of them used the Internet daily through their mobile phones.

ECM Libra noted that among the initiatives by Maxis to create quality mobile content were Maxis’ mobile content challenge which encouraged Malaysian students to develop content and be rewarded with prizes, Maxis developer programme which provided mentoring, training and equipment to local content developers and Maxis 1Store which allowed content developers to host their applications online for purchase by Maxis customers.

The research house pointed out that besides mobile content, Maxis was also aiming for a huge slice of the mobile advertising market for non-voice revenue with the launch of ‘myDeals’, its new-generation permission-based mobile advertising. The advertising was carried via Vienna-based Out There Media’s multi-channel mobile advertising marketplace technology called ‘Mobucks”.

ECM Libra stated that Maxis’ chief operating officer (COO) Jean-Pascal van Overbeke last week said with Malaysia projected to have 42.5 million mobile subscribers by 2014, the mobile advertising industry was enjoying strong growth helped by the increasingly simplified use of mobile Internet with handheld smart phones.

He estimated the global mobile advertising sector to grow to US$16 billion by 2015. Currently, 12 partners had signed up for the new services, including Malaysia Airlines, Colgate-Palmolive, Panasonic and BMW. The research house added that with the new services, advertisers could deliver targeted advertisements to their targeted audiences and get more effective responses.

Axiata Group Bhd (Axiata) was ECM Libra’s top pick given its strong growth prospects underpinned by high teens growth in PT XL Axiata Tbk and high single digit growth in Celcom.

In addition, Axiata possessed the strongest growth prospects and cheapest financial year 2011 price earnings multiple valuations in comparison to its peers. Valuations were fair for other stocks under coverage as earnings growth would likely be tepid going forward as the mobile market in Malaysia was increasingly saturated.