Smart-PLDT Launches Free Wi-Fi at Dumaguete Airport

Dumaguete City –- Smart Communications and PLDT formally launched their free Wi-Fi project Wednesday at the Dumaguete-Sibulan airport in Negros Oriental in response to President Rodrigo Duterte’s call for better Internet services in the country.

The super speed, global standard Smart Wi-Fi at the Dumaguete airport is the 8th installation site in the Philippines and the 4th in the Visayas, according to Harold Kim Orbase, PLDT AVP head for Enterprise Services.

This Wi-Fi is backed up by PLDT’s one gigabit backbone and can provide high speed Internet service to airport users at no cost at all and with no buffering, Orbase explained.

The project is in partnership with the Department of Transportation (DOT) and in response to the commitment of the agency for the first 100 days of the agency to install high speed Wi-Fi connectivity in major transport hubs across the country.

High speed Internet access will “ensure and enable our travelers in and out of the main airports to be more productive”, and to be connected to their families and friends from the airports while in transit, according to Orbase.

This is actually the objective of their partnership with government, as well the company’s commitment to their subscribers and the Filipino people, he added.

Orbase assured that unless DOT sets limits or imposes regulations, the Wi-Fi at the Dumaguete airport will remain for free and without cap.

It will be accessible 24 hours a day and within a 50 to 70 meters radius, reaching even the parking areas of the airport, he added.

Dumaguete airport OIC Engr. Elmer Ablir welcomed this development, saying that he is happy that Dumaguete has been chosen as a transport hub to be provided with high-speed Internet access.

Ablir said he accepts the newly-installed free Wi-Fi at the Dumaguete airport in behalf of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines and the Department of Transportation.

Aside from Dumaguete, Smart-PLDT has also installed free WiFi at the airports in Bacolod, Iloilo and Roxas in the Visayas, and in Davao, Cagayan and Zamboanga in Mindanao.

The first site or airport where this project was launched is in Clark in Luzon, said Orbase.

Orbase is confident that Smart-PLDT will be able to complete the installation of all 24 major transport hubs in the country by September, well within the first 100 days of the administration of President Duterte. (PNA) LAP/JFP