By NG MIN SHEN / Pic By HUSSEIN SHAHARUDDIN

Tune Talk Sdn Bhd aims to attract one million active subscribers within a year, driven by its regional footprint expansion plan and the move to offer postpaid services.

CFO Dajmarehan Zolkipli said currently, the mobile virtual network operator has about 600,000 active subscribers in Malaysia.

“We’re hoping to raise this to one million active revenue-generating subscribers locally, as well as regionally, within a year from now,” she said at the launch of Tune Talk’s Merdeka campaign in conjunction with its ninth-year anniversary in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.

She said since AirAsia Group Bhd is one of the operator’s key corporate backers, this will be achieved by the group’s expansion into regional countries, particularly destinations that AirAsia flies to.

According to the company’s website, its two major shareholders are Celcom Axiata Bhd with a 35% stake and Tune Group Sdn Bhd with 25.1%.

“We’re also looking into a travel pass that can be utilised for countries across the Asian region, where AirAsia flies into. We are also leveraging on AirAsia’s expansion plans as that would mean more traveller touchpoints,” Tune Talk CMO Joseph Lim (picture) said.

The operator is eyeing neighbouring countries such as Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Japan and Australia, as these are AirAsia’s most frequently travelled routes.

“In 2015, we had about 1.1 million subscribers. Since then, competition has been very stiff,” Lim said.

He said in addition to its 600,000 revenue-generating users, the operator has about 400,000 “grace period” subscribers. These are users who have been barred from making outgoing calls, sending SMS or utilising mobile data.

According to Lim, the operator’s main challenge is the ongoing price competition with other telcos such as U Mobile Sdn Bhd, which is constantly updating its plans with attractive low prices.

“We compete on lifestyle benefits and through our partnership with over 50 mer- chants, we have one of the biggest loyalty programmes in the country. We hope subscribers will see that for us, the price difference translates to non-monetary benefits.”

Tune Talk is also planning to venture into postpaid by the fourth quarter of this year as it has, over the past two years, seen a growing trend of prepaid users moving to postpaid.

Tune Group is jointly owned by AirAsia CEO Tan Sri Dr Tony Fernandes and Datuk Kamarudin Meranun.