Smart-govt partnering on a roll

Best Community Telecom Project	Smart's NOAH Mobile
Last year's winner:	Smart's SHINE
Business segments:	Mobile voice and data, m-payments
President & CEO:	Napoleon Nazareno
Key stats (2012):	reported income of 30.3 billion pesos ($740 million), up 19% yoy (FY12); 54.2 million mobile subscribers, up 13%

Smart keeps this award for the second year straight, hinting at productive partnership projects with government entities.

Knowing that the Philippines ranks fourth of 190 countries as most vulnerable to extreme weather events, according to the 2013 Global Climate Risk Index, Smart developed an app that allows mobile users to download real-time weather information from the Department of Science and Technology's website.

The app - NOAH (Nationwide Operational Assessment of Hazards) Mobile - gives the Philippines' 100 million mobile users easy access to critical weather forecasts such as typhoon tracking and location-based rainfall predictions. The service enables local disaster risk reduction officers to check weather forecast in their respective locations, allowing them to monitor potential danger, warn people and take the necessary actions to ensure community safety.

The service of course is dependent on widespread and high-speed access. Smart last year finished "super-charging" its network under parent company PLDT's $1.6 billion network transformation program. In August it launched the first commercially available LTE service in the Philippines, and one of the first in Asia. Two months later Smart linked all its Metro Manila cell sites via fiber-optic cables and completed linking its cell sites nationwide with those of sister company Sun Cellular.

"Smart has pursued an internet-for-all advocacy by launching a wide array of mobile internet-capable devices, and service offerings that make it affordable for Filipinos to use mobile data," said Ramon Isberto, head of public affairs at Smart.

The company launched its Flexisurf broadband plans - with several plans priced at between $7 and $15 a month.