Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission publishes Updated Licensing Guidebook
20 April 2023
The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (“MCMC”) has recently published the latest edition of its Licensing Guidebook on its official website, updated as of 1st April 2023. A summary of the salient changes is set out below.
Additional Requirements for Individual Licence Applications
Most notably, the updated Licensing Guidebook sets out the following additional requirements for individual licence applicants:
- An applicant for a Network Facilities Provider (NFP) and Network Service Provider (NSP) individual licence must now ensure it has a minimum paid-up capital of RM2,000,000 (an increase from the previous minimum of RM500,000). The minimum paid-up capital of an applicant for a Content Applications Service Provider (CASP) individual licence remains unchanged at RM500,000.
- The net tangible assets of an individual licence applicant based on its latest audited accounts must be at least RM500,000.
- An individual licence applicant must have at least 30% Bumiputera shareholding.
- An individual licence applicant must show proof of the availability of at least 10% of the amount of the total capital expenditure and operating expense projected for a 5-year period in the detailed business plan submitted to MCMC as a part of its licence application.
Procedural Changes
The updated Licensing Guidebook has also introduced some procedural changes to licence applications as follows:
- Payments for licence applications are now to be made via online transfer; the MCMC will provide applicants with the relevant payment details upon receipt of a complete submission.
- Class and individual licence applications (including renewal and transfer applications) are to be submitted via email to licensing@mcmc.gov.my, addressed to the head of the MCMC’s licensing department.
Comments
There are still some questions relating to the updates to the Licensing Guidebook that remain to be answered (e.g. whether the updates and the additional requirements have come into force, and whether they will affect pending applications). We will issue an update to this alert once we have received further information on the same. Nonetheless, interested parties should take note of the updates to the Licensing Guidebook, in particular on the additional requirements imposed on individual licence applicants.
The updated Licensing Guidebook can be accessed
here.
Alert by Charmayne Ong (Partner), Jillian Chia (Partner), Natalie Lim (Partner), Beatrice Yew (Associate) and Cheam Tat Sean (Associate) of the Technology, Media, and Telecommunications Practice of Skrine.
This alert contains general information only. It does not constitute legal advice nor an expression of legal opinion and should not be relied upon as such. For further information, kindly contact skrine@skrine.com.