At the Globe annual stockholders' meeting

We’ve been attending the Annual Shareholder’s meeting of Globe Telecom for close to 10 years now, where for the first time, Cebu journalists are brought to Manila and sit on a conference room with our Manila-based counterparts. This has been expanded to include the media from the Visayas and Mindanao and there were many of them for this meeting.

Despite a very difficult year, Globe revealed that for the year 2010, its consolidated 4th quarter revenues was P16.7 billion, one of the highest in Globe Telecom history, a surge driven by the core mobile business that was 13% higher versus the last quarter. Thus the year ended with service revenues of P62.6 billion, slightly higher than 2009’s P62.4 billion.

On Monday night, the media from the Visayas and Mindanao had dinner with Globe President Ernest Cu were most of the questions thrown at him was the effect of the PLDT, SMART merger with Digitel. But Globe’s Ernest showed an uncanny confidence pointing out that “Globe is about the customer” a phrase he repeated during his report during the Shareholders meeting. This merger has turned the three Telecom giants into a duopoly.

But Globe Telecom officials are rolling out innovative new products and services anchored on personalization, led by the All New My Super Plan that gives their customers a monthly service fee suited to their respective budgets, which has boost postpaid subscribers and addresses market reality and client needs.

I had a chance to talk with Globe Chairman Jaime Augusto Zobel and he was gung-ho that Globe Telecom, despite it’s status as the second Telco, can beat the odds through innovative programs and above all, a reliable systems, which has been boosted when he announced a US$500 capital expenditure to improve systems reliability. Globe’s new Store Concept began last year with 19 new stores nationwide, where customer service has greatly been enhanced by an uncanny attention based on customer satisfaction.

Globe came up with a new mission and vision statement, dubbed “The Globe Way” which goes, “We put our customers first; Our people make the difference. We act with integrity. We care like an owner. We keep things simple. To us, it’s be fast or be the last!” This is the kind of vision and mission statement that garnered Globe the 4th place amongst the 200 Corporations in Wall Street Journal for 2009. Good governance resulted in an uptrend driven by continuing improvements in mobile industry, which Globe now claims to have 26.4 million SIMs.

About the merger between PLDT and Digitel, I learned that this apparently has to get the nod of the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC), which in my book is considered a shoo-in. In other countries, government regulators would question a merger such as this because it is not good for the subscribers. It is akin to buying out the competition so that they could increase their rates later. So how this duopoly would be played out, we consumers will know more on this in the next few months.

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Remember the days when we needed an Anti-Carnapping (ANCAR) permit when we ship our cars to cross to Negros, Bohol or Leyte? I’m sure most motorists remember those days, where you had to go to the Constabulary Highway Patrol (CHP) to get that permit and prove that your car wasn’t stolen. The reason why the ANCAR permit was required in those days was to stop carnapped vehicles from being shipped from island to island. But despite the ANCAR permits, carnapped vehicles from Metro Manila still found its way to the Visayas and Mindanao.

In the end, the ANCAR permits because a moneymaking venture of the CHP, which has now been renamed the Traffic Management Group (TMG). Back then, if you crossed to Dumaguete from Cebu you needed to prove that your car wasn’t stolen. Yet three days later you wanted to cross from Cebu City to Bohol, you again needed to get an ANCAR permit to prove once more that your car wasn’t stolen.

Under Philippine laws, we recognize that legal dictum of right of innocence until guilt is proven. But as requirement for an ANCAR permit, the TMB effectively considers all vehicles as stolen, until the owner proves otherwise. Last week, I gathered that Pres. Benigno “PNoy” Aquino III was supposed to have signed the resurrection of the ANCAR permits but this was rescheduled because the Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) is against it. I was even surprised why the Tourism Secretary didn’t say anything when this is detrimental to our domestic tourism. If and when the ANCAR permits are brought back, it would put the brakes on our domestic tourism. So don’t say I didn’t warn you folks.

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