Maxis has revised its Home Internet Fibre (FTTH) broadband service which now offers 10Mbps, 20Mbps and 30Mbps option. The baseline 10Mbps plan is now priced higher at RM148/month for Maxis subscribers who have a minimum monthly commitment of RM48/month. Non-Maxis subscribers would need to pay RM168/month for 10Mbps.

For those with the need for speed, they are offering faster 20Mbps and 30Mbps at RM198/month and RM248/month respectively. Non-Maxis subscribers would have to fork out more, almost up to RM50 extra for the 30Mbps which is a carrot for customers to port their mobile service with them.

Apart from internet service, they are giving 100 minutes of calls to Maxis mobile numbers and 100 minutes of IDD calls to selected countries on the 10Mbps option. For each higher plan (20Mbps and 30Mbps), you’ll get additional 100 minutes for each notch higher. As usual, all calls to Maxis fixed lines are free.

The good news is that all plans have unlimited quota until further notice and they are still having the RM200 standard installation fee waived.

For more info, head over to Maxis Home Internet page.

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Maxis today has announced its partnership with 14 content providers to offer IPTV service on its Maxis Home Fibre Internet. If you’re a Maxis Fibre user, you can look forward to a wide range of HD and 3D content along with catch-up TV and PVR features with your subscription soon.

The 14 content providers that Maxis partnered with are Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM), All Asia Multimedia Networks FZ-LLC, Media Prima Berhad, LI TV International Ltd, Red Bull GmbH, Five Star Production Co. Ltd, Vision Plus Entertainment Sdn Bhd, Travel Channel International Limited, Asa’ad Entertainment Network Sdn Bhd, Brilliant Pictures, Five Star Trading, Trace TV S.A., The Wiggles International Pty Ltd and Classic Media Distribution Limited.

In terms of Free to Air, the channels include TV1, TV2, TVi, TV3, NTV7, 8TV, TV9 along with additional content from LI Space, LI Body, LI Savour, LI Chic, Tonton, Travel Channel, Wiggles, Jump, Classic Media, Trace Urban, Trace Sports, XS, Red Bull, Five Star Trading, Five Star Production, Brilliant Pictures and Asa’ad.

Currently Maxis Home Fibre Internet is available across 1.2 million homes and offices in Malaysia while its 3G Wireless Internet service with its 82% population coverage covers nearly 6 million homes. So far no IPTV subscription and available dates were mentioned.

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Maxis has expanded its business fibre broadband offerings with a range of dynamic IP plans for businesses that do not require a fixed IP connection. There are three plans to choose from and the operator has been very clever in pricing the plans to place them close to what the competitors are offering while at the same time appear to have plans that provide a better value proposition.

Take the mid-range plan for example. Maxis charges RM308/month for its 16Mbps dynamic IP business fibre plan while P1 charges RM329 for its 15Mbps dynamic IP business fibre package. At the same time, the plans from Maxis and P1 sit in between TM’s UniFi for business offering with its 10Mbps plan costing RM289/month and the top of the line 20Mbps plan costing RM359.

Obviously the example above does not take into consideration the various value added services offered by the three service providers and this is because, in this market, with the way the operators have structured their plans, choosing the best plan for you will ultimately come down to how your business utilizes communications. Will you be making a lot of calls to fixed line numbers? Will you be making a lot of calls to mobile number? Is a plan with bundled webhosting something that’s important to you? Will your business be doing a lot of SMS blasts?

These are all things that you need to consider when looking at the dynamic IP fiber plans being offered for businesses. Most important is, how much speed you would need for your operations because at the end of the day, the level of performance that the three operators offer in terms of broadband speed will be almost identical. The dynamics in the fibre broadband landscape has certainly changed significantly with more operators offering the service giving consumers the power to choice. So in this case it all comes down to which brand is able to serve you the best.

For more information on the Maxis dynamic IP fibre plans for businesses, click here.

Thanks Paul Tan for the tip.

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Maxis has slashed its 10Mbps Home HSBB plan almost by half from RM218/month to a newly reduced RM118/month. This makes it the most affordable 10Mbps HSBB Fibre plan in the market, which is even lower than UniFi’s VIP 5Mbps at RM149/month and P1’s F1 OneFibre 5Mbps plan at RM169/month.

Even with the reduced price, Maxis is still pre bundling Unlimited free calls within Maxis fixed lines, 600 minutes free calls to Maxis Mobile numbers, 200 minutes of IDD calls and additional 150 minutes on your Maxis mobile subscription. The 10Mbps plan comes with 100GB of data quota which is currently unlimited until further notice.

To add more pressure to drive sign ups, the RM200 installation fee waiver is valid until 30th of June 2012. Those that sign up will be bound by 24 months contract. For existing subscribers, the FAQ mentions that you can migrate to this new plan as long as you’ve completed 12 months of your existing contract. Once you’ve moved to this new plan with the cheaper subscription fee, your contract will be automatically renewed to 24 months as a contract extension. If you decide to terminate earlier, you are required to pay the balance of the subscription fees within the contract at RM118/month.

Earlier on, Maxis has a total of 4 HSBB plans for home ranging from 4Mbps to 30Mbps and now it appears that they have reduced their offering with just 2 plans – 10Mbps & 30Mbps. For the 30Mbps plan, the subscription remains unchanged at RM398/month with 300GB of quota, which is also currently unlimited until further notice.

For more information, head over to Maxis HSBB page.

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After introducing its 32Mbps FTTH plan for office users, Maxis has also introduced a higher speed plan for home users with the need for speed.

They have introduced a 30Mbps plan at RM398 per month which comes with 300GB data quota. This comes out to RM1.33 per GB, the lowest ever cost per GB even in our last broadband comparison update. According to the details above, the quota is only enforced in 2012 which means unlimited downloads for now. Overall, this is 3X the speed and 3X the quota of Maxis Home Broadband Advance at RM218/month.

Also included is 1000 minutes of calls to Maxis Mobile and 300 minutes of calls to IDD. For existing Maxis mobile users, you’ll get 200 minutes too. Calls to Maxis fixed lines are free.

As comparison, the highest home plan for TM’s UniFi is VIP 20 which offers 20Mbps with 120GB quota at RM249 a month. This comes out to RM2.08 per GB. At the present moment, TM is yet to enforce their download quota fully. We wonder if TM Unifi will respond with a higher speed and quota package.

To register for more info, head over to Maxis home broadband page.

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UPDATE: Paul Tan also pointed out that if you’re looking for a fixed IP connection on the cheap. Maxis offers fixed IP across all it’s business FTTH packages even the entry-level 4Mbps RM188/month plan. UniFi on the other hand, does not offer fixed IP for its cheapest BIZ5 RM199/month plan.

If you’re looking for a fibre broadband connection, there are alternatives to TM’s UniFi. There’s Time Fibre which offers FTTH service, but its limited service locations means its not really a feasible alternative for the masses. Then there’s Maxis FTTH which offers a low entry point for those looking at a cheap and reliable FTTH broadband solution.

But so far, the alternatives has been mostly focused on consumer plans, now Maxis has upped the ante with a range of FTTH packages catered for businesses with packages that nicely fills in the gaps of UniFi’s BIZ offerings. So let’s see how the Maxis plans stack up against the TM’s UniFi.

Where UniFi offers three packages — BIZ5 (RM199/month), BIZ10 (RM599/month) and BIZ20 (RM899/month), Maxis offers up four — 4Mbps (RM188/month), 8Mbps (RM388/month), 16Mbps (RM688/month) and 32Mbps (RM988).

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Update: We’re gotten some response from both Maxis and TM PR with more information on their services. Maxis says that their Home Broadband is currently available in the following areas — Bangsar, Taman Tun Doktor Ismail and Bandar Utama.

TM tells us that one of the other value added service that they offer with UniFi is the Streamyx ZONE WiFi hotspot access. UniFi subscribers get free WiFi access at over 12,000 Streamyx ZONE WiFi hotspots nationwide albeit limited to 384kbps. We have a feeling not many UniFi subscribers are aware of this, so to find out what your Streamyx ZONE login ID is give UniFi a call at 1 300 88 1221. Also TM points out that currently it has yet to enforce data quotas for UniFi subscribers across the board. This explains why TM have subscribers who download terabytes of data on UniFi.

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Maxis recently updated its HSBB service offering with three different plans where previously there was only one to choose from. This move makes Maxis a direct competitor to Malaysia’s premier HSBB provider, UniFi. This is good for the consumer because now there is more choice and more choice means better value as providers offer the best rates and services to vie for your attention.

On the surface this is the case but between the two, which provider offers the best value for money? We’ve assembled this comparison table for you to easily compare the offerings from TM and Maxis.

So how does the two fair? If it was us forking out the cash, which one would we choose?

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Update: Maxis has updated its HSBB plan yet again, where previously the Standard and Value plans get different equipment bundle (an Aztech DECT phone and a residential gateway respectively), the new plans now offer both equipments together. So if you subscribe to the Maxis Standard or Value HSBB plans you get both the residential gateway and Aztech DECT phone.

Maxis launched it’s HSBB service late October last year but you might not be aware of this because it is not as heavily promoted as their mobile broadband offerings. Initially, Maxis had offered only one plan offering a 6Mbps line plus VOIP for RM118/month for existing Maxis and RM158/month for non-Maxis subscribers.

Today, Maxis updated it’s HSBB service with three new plans — 4Mbps with 30GB quota for RM128/month, 6Mbps with 60GB quota for RM158/month and 10Mbps with 60GB quota 100GB quota for RM218/month with varying monthly data quotas. All the plans include VOIP which requires a RM75 deposit (RM300 if you’re not a Malaysian resident).

In addition to the broadband and VOIP packages, Maxis is offering value added services that include music downloads, internet security, IPTV and an integrated inbox. All these offerings however come with separate charges. For more details head on over to Maxis.

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On top of that, Maxis is offering preferential rates to its FTTH customers who would like to sign-up for its 3G broadband service. Based on the previous offering from Maxis, this updated offer is more expensive but does offer a free 3G MiFi if you subscribe to a higher monthly plan.

But having said that, even the add-on 3G plans that offer just a USB dongle has increased in price where previously, you can get a 1.5GB/month 3G broadband plan for RM20, the new plan charges over double that — RM48 for 1.5GB/month.

Similar to UniFi, Maxis charges for RM200 installation for its high-speed broadband plans and all plans come with 24-months contract. Unlike UniFi however, where the equipment that you get is similar no matter what plan you subscribe to, with Maxis, different plans give you different equipment and depending on what equipment you get, you might have to consider the additional cost of purchasing more equipment to make full use of the services offered by the Maxis HSBB plan.

For example, from what it says on the website, if you subscribe to the cheapest Maxis HSBB plan — which is the 4Mbps RM128/month — you get an Aztech (yes, Aztech) DECT phone. This means you’ll have to purchase a FTTH modem separately. This is weird considering the fact that most people would have a phone already so it would make more sense just to offer a FTTH gateway across the board to make the entry cost low.

It looks to us that Maxis is trying to force customers to purchase the more expansive plans because it looks more attractive as the entry costs are low (you don’t have to buy a gateway). In the the long term however, subscription cost is high but more lucrative to Maxis.

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