Hong Kong, March 25, 2015 – Telecom Asia Magazine today announced the finalists in its 18th Telecom Asia Awards, with 13 judges nominating their top choices in 12 out of 15 categories.
This year’s shortlist – which features 37 nominated companies across 12 Asia-Pacific markets – sees strong representation of innovation from both developed and emerging markets, with Smart Communications of the Philippines and Australia’s Telstra tied for the most nominations at seven each.
SK Telecom and NTT Communications are both up for four awards categories this year. BT Global Services is in the running for three categories.
Another 12 operators have garnered two nominations each across a wide variety of categories. They include AT&T, China Mobile, Global Cloud Xchange, Globe Telecom, Hutchison Global Communications, Indosat, M1, NTT DoCoMo, Pacnet, SingTel, Telekom Malaysia and XL Axiata.
This year’s Telecom CEO of the Year category features several familiar faces, including SK Telecom’s Sung Min Ha, Softbank’s Masayoshi Son, PLDT/Smart’s Napoleon Nazareno and Telstra’s David Thodey. Also up for the award is China Mobile’s Li Yue.
Meanwhile, the Best Mobile Carrier list features heavy hitters like NTT DoCoMo, SK Telecom and Telstra and challengers like Malaysia’s DiGi and South Korea’s LG U+.
This year’s shortlist also reflects the status of Indonesia as a major up-and-coming market in the region, with three operators – Indosat, Telkomsel and XL Axiata – up for five awards this year. The markets of India, Malaysia and the Philippines are also well represented this year, with three operators from each market in the shortlist.
Myanmar makes its debut appearance in the TA Awards with Ooredoo Myanmar in the running for Best Community Telecom Project.
This year’s awards also features two new categories: Best Mobile Payment Service and Most Innovative Video Service Project. The payment category drew the largest number of nominations of any other category, and the shortlist covers a variety of solutions from both emerging markets (Indosat, Smart and Vodafone India) and developed markets (KDDI and SingTel).
Meanwhile, contenders for the Video Service category include Smart, KT and HKTV.
The shortlist was compiled from nominations made by the judging panel and Telecom Asia readers, as well as the TA editorial team.
“Between the addition of several new categories and the level of enthusiasm from both judges and readers, we have a suitably diverse lineup of nominees this year," said Telecom Asia editor-in-chief John Tanner, “especially in the innovation-driven categories.”
As with last year, there were no nominations for the Best Asia Telecom Carrier, as we’ve made it a best-of-the-best award that goes to the company receiving the most points across all categories during voting.
Now in its 18th year, the awards are the region’s longest-running and most prestigious telecom industry awards. They reward innovative and outstanding performance by Asian service providers and industry executives. The awards are held in conjunction with Telecom Asia's Telco Strategies conference. The theme for 2015 is “Strategies For Thriving in The Age of Disruption”.
Final selection is made by an independent panel of industry experts, who will cast votes on the basis of innovation, financial performance, technology, market leadership and corporate governance. Winners will be notified in April. The awards will be presented at a ceremony on May 20 in Jakarta.