Expecting Traffic To Increase By 15 Percent, XL Axiata Commits To Strengthening Communication Networks During Ramadan And Eid 2022

Photo: Doc. XL Axiata

JAKARTA - PT XL Axiata Tbk (EXCL) has strengthened its telecommunications network to face Ramadan and Eid this year. Strengthening the data network needs to be done in anticipation of a possible spike in usage traffic throughout Ramadan and especially during the long Eid holiday.

"Moreover, with easing from the government along with the decline in Covid-19 cases, community mobility will also increase," said Director & Chief Technology Officer XL Axiata, I Gede Darmayusa in a statement, Monday, March 28.

Gede estimates that traffic will increase by up to 10 percent during Ramadan compared to traffic on weekdays, and will increase to 15 percent when entering the Lebaran holiday period. In addition to increasing capacity, other anticipatory steps are in the form of network optimization by looking at the possibility of community or customer mobility movements during the Eid holiday period.

"For that purpose, a number of areas that are usually the destination of going home, especially on the island of Java, will be of special concern," said Gede.

Special locations that become crowded places every time the long holiday period comes also do not go unnoticed. In addition to tourist sites, there are also shopping centers, places of departure for passengers, both land, air, and sea modes of transportation. Also, of course, strengthening the network along inter-provincial highways, both toll and non-toll roads, both in Java and outside Java.

In addition, XL Axiata also takes into account the possibility of increasing traffic driven by technological developments. Every year, of course, technology is getting more advanced, which is applied by the latest smartphones and gadgets.

The more sophisticated the gadget, the more features with better capabilities, which makes users comfortable, and ultimately increases data usage. For example, the trend of using video streaming will increase when every smartphone level is now able to provide easy access to streaming video with maximum quality.

"Currently, on a normal day, XL Axiata's data network traffic is 22 PB (Petabyte). However, to ensure our network's ability to accommodate traffic spikes later, we will continue to increase the capacity up to 3x from normal days," added Gede.

Until the end of 2021, the XL Axiata network was spread across 34 provinces, a total of 458 cities/districts. Some of the networks have penetrated and served people in remote areas and are located on national borders.

A total of 162 thousand BTS, including 77 thousand 4G BTS, and a fiber-optic network of more than 113 thousand kilometers, support the strength of XL Axiata's network, to serve 57.9 million subscribers.