PLDT has launched a rather interesting new fixed line service called Always On. The product is essentially a marriage of a fixed line fiber modem and a wireless LTE modem in one piece of hardware.
At the launch, PLDT execs were very candid about the red blinking light that has caused a lot of anxiety among its subscribers: what happens when your Internet cable gets cut by accident or you lose fiber signal due to storms and other occurrences? When you lose Internet, the modem automatically switches you to LTE data via WiFi. There’s a lot of interesting tech going on behind the scenes – the transition is seamless, which means you won’t need to log into a different WiFi service or have your movie buffer or lose connection to your multiplayer game.
“We call this ‘Always On.’ In the event of a service interruption, you don’t need to worry about losing access to the internet. Even with a severed cable, you will stay connected and pursue your online activities with minimal interruption,” said Jeremiah de la Cruz, Senior Vice President and Head of Home Business Group at PLDT.
When the device detects downtime and switches to LTE,the new Always On modem will also file a service repair ticket so that customers no longer have to report loss of service.
“We wanted to create a product that was responsive to the needs of our customers. We believe this will help elevate the internet standard in the country,” added de la Cruz.
The one caveat to the service is that as a consumer you won’t be able to take your modem out and treat it like a portable hotspot as it is geofenced to your residential area. In the future, PLDT aims to deploy similar modems for its other products including Gigabit Fiber, which includes the technology to automatically send a service ticket and dispatch a repair team without you having to do any reporting.
