Communications Association sees high-potential in Macau as new technology testing ground

The Macao Communications Development Association (MCDA) believes that Macau’s geographic location and size could be an advantage for the implementation and testing of new technologies, which could lead not only to the higher development of information and communication technologies locally, but also to boost economic diversification.
Such opinion was aired to the Times in an exclusive interview with several association members. “Macau, given its geographic size, would be the ideal place not only to implement some of those new innovative technologies [like the 5G network] that [find many challenges being implemented in other regions], but we could be used as a testing ground for several [other] technologies that are being developed and that could help in further developing the market,” Carlos Rui Marcelo, the association’s General Assembly Vice-President told the Times, adding that this was one of the primary factors that united the founders of the association, established in April 2019.
For MCDA members, the fact that Macau is small in scale, often seen as a disadvantage, can be turned into an important advantage as the Special Administrative Region functions at the scale of a metropolis. The investment needed to test new technologies linked to Smart Cities would be far less than in any neighboring city.

The lost edge
One of the areas the association is focusing its work on is the regaining of Macau’s prior status as an advanced city in terms of technology and communications.
Before the handover, Macau was regarded as one of the most advanced cities in the region, and even the world, in terms of communications, and was also on the vanguard of the internet, a status that quickly subsided due to a lack of tenacity in continuing to pursue higher goals.
“Maybe 20-plus years ago we used to be at the forefront of technology. Macau used to be a very innovative city and in recent years we lost that edge,” Marcelo told the Times, adding, “We didn’t lose it because we didn’t have the skillsets or the knowledge, we lost it because the aggressiveness in terms of implementation of innovation and new technologies subsided throughout these years and that’s why we think it is extremely important that we become much more aggressive in the next few years.”
For the MCDA Vice-President, one of the ways in which the Covid-19 pandemic contributed to highlighting flaws within the system is through “showing us that collaboration tools have become extremely important for the livelihood of citizens and if we don’t have an infrastructure that makes that possible it’s going to be extremely challenging.”

A free market would boost tech advances, services
For the MCDA, one of the most important aspects that could shift technology back onto the right track involves the establishing of a free market for communications in which all players could compete fairly, presenting new services and technological advancements that would benefit everyone.
“Everybody nowadays is paying [for goods and services] using a mobile phone. We used to have a percentage of the online market that was roughly [a few years ago] maybe around 15 to 18% but it has jumped at least to 30% last year, or in the last couple of years, and that gives us a clear indication of what is important to address,” Marcelo said, adding, “Data is a very important part and so we need to have an infrastructure that supports that sort of behavior. I’m pretty sure that all the operators in Macau are willing to support that. A free market is an important tool to facilitate competition and to facilitate innovation.”
To this end, both decision-makers and stakeholders cannot continue to blame any of the players, but instead “find ways to collaborate and promote healthy competition because that will help the market. We know there are several important problems with the current system but what is important to understand is that without the support or proper guidance in regards to how we can move from A to B, it is going to be very challenging [to move past the current state] and to be at the forefront of innovation. That is what Macau could be good at,” Marcelo reaffirmed, adding that one of the important focuses for the association is to provide help and expertise in the field to encourage collaboration between parties.
The lack of competition and its consequences was also addressed in the same interview by another MCDA board member, Board of Directors President Windus Lam, who to the Times stated, “Officially home broadband and business broadband has been liberalized for over 20 years. But what this means [in reality] is that anyone can apply to provide that service. However, this is a very limited opportunity as our connection is very limited and we need to rely on international connectivity. At that time, the liberalization was not followed by an encouragement to investment [in the network] and to encourage the sole-operator to open up the facilities to other competitors. That is what created the situation we have right now in which you don’t have a choice,” explaining that such lack of action from the government limited possible investment in and consequent development of the products and services available in Macau for people and businesses.
Questioned by the Times if the current telecommunication infrastructure is enough to support the growing demand for data and online services, Lam said, “It depends if you are analyzing [from] today’s [point-of-view] or if you are looking from today and forward. For most people (for individual use) we can say that the current speed and service are probably enough but people are using more applications that are bandwidth-hungry such as video streaming and others. With added demand, the natural consequence is the degradation of the quality of the service,” adding “at the backend what drives the bandwidth capacity is the infrastructure and we are talking about both the local network and the overseas network and that is the bigger problem for the implementation of the 5G network.”
As Lam explained further, “In the past, we only needed one network, but the infrastructure needed to support 5G or 6G may easily need to double or triple [at the start], and increase to 6-fold or even 10-fold, and that is why there is an issue regarding the investment needed,” leading him to conclude that if the government does not take the lead to change the competitive environment, it will be impossible to attract other players to invest in this market as well as to attract talent in this field from other parts of the world to Macau.
“Regulations are causing us to lag behind because the ‘door is not open at all’ and traditionally, we have been pointing the finger to the potential players saying that they are not working hard enough and that is not the case. It’s the environment itself that is limiting any new players from competing as fair players,” Lam concluded.

HR is a challenge for the market
Another big challenge as a hindering factor in the development of the market in Macau is the lack of human resources (HR) in the field.
“I think there are a few challenges in the market. One [of them] is actually about how to create the incentive for new people to find the industry attractive after they finish their [university] studies. Because [historically] it has been easy for people to go into tourism and find jobs where skillsets are also scarce in Macau and are paid quite well. What we have assisted in the last 10 to 20 years, particularly with the liberalization of the gaming industry, is that people tend to find jobs in areas for which they did not have specific [college] training,” Marcelo said.
These factors point to another direction for the MCDA which elected as one of the goals to help drive incentives within the industry for professionals, trained in technology and telecommunications, to continue to promote and implement innovation.
“Some parts of this sector are not that interesting, but the innovative technologies are, and that is why 5G and subsequent technologies play an important role in the future of the industry because they bring ways of use technologies that not only communicate with other sectors but also bring a cohesiveness,” Marcelo said.
For instance, he added, “the Internet of Things, which is an important aspect of technology that can be supported by these new tools and applications is not possible if we don’t bring together a convergence of technologies.”

To channel know-how to keep competence
Founded by communication professionals with a vast knowledge of the industry and experience of over 30 years, the MCDA aims to channel this knowledge to the current and future generations to benefit the industry. They believe it has great potential to become one of the sectors that can contribute to Macau’s economic diversification.
“If we don’t channel this knowledge into new professionals in the market, we will be extremely dependent on external competency and manpower, and companies that might want to come to Macau and invest in Macau will be limited to a certain technology that might be imposed upon the market,” Marcelo said, adding to the comments by MCDA Board of Directors Vice-President, Xeque Harun Hamja.
Hamja was discussing how the existing know-how is important not only to promote new advancements, but to maintain some of the existing technology.
“If any company wants to hire a Switch engineer that is impossible. There is none locally,” he said, adding “the old ones are all retiring and the new generation has no training in this field. I believe that [unless we do something about it now] within the next 5 to 10 years there will be no local people working in this sector in Macau.”
According to data from the association, the market in Macau for the telecom and information technology sectors already presents a deficit in manpower of about 40 to 50% of the demand in the sector.
Hamja also noted that nowadays, telecom services are as important a commodity as water or electricity.