This article appeared in The malaysiakini on 03 March 2022.

COMMENT | Emir Research, a think tank which specialises in developing strategic policy recommendations, has recently published a series of four articles in which it raises important questions about how 5G mobile services should be rolled out in Malaysia.

It claims that “the so-called single wholesale network (SWN) model proposition by Digital Nasional Berhad (DNB), as it stands today, doesn’t hold water from the perspectives of nation-building, technical feasibility, financial and commercial viability as well as governance and integrity”.

In this note, Plum Consulting assesses the validity of this overall claim and the key arguments which Emir has made to support it in its four articles. Our assessment is made in the context of the Malaysian government’s decision between...