In a regular new series, Mobile World Live‘s Asia Editor Joseph Waring provides a regional roundup of news snippets:

Postpaid drives 18% growth at Globe
Globe Telecom in the Philippines announced today its postpaid revenue, which increased 11 per cent, was the key driver behind its 18 per cent profit jump in the first half of the year.

Postpaid revenue reached PHP14.6 billion ($333 million) and accounted for 39 per cent of total mobile revenue during the period ending 30 June. Postpaid connections grew 10 per cent to 2.1 million.

The operator said it added nearly 400,000 postpaid connections in the first six months of the year, up 12 per cent from the same period last year amid intense competition in the Philippine’s postpaid market.

Globe controls 44 per cent of the country’s postpaid market while Smart has a 54 per cent share, according to GSMA Intelligence. About 5 per cent of Globe’s 42.7 million connections are postpaid; 2.5 million of Smart’s 68.9 million connections are postpaid.

Globe’s overall market share climbed to 38 per cent during H1 from a year ago as Smart’s dropped from 66.5 per cent to 61 per cent during the period.

Wi-Fi for Japan visitors
NTT Docomo has introduced high-speed Wi-Fi service on a trial basis for travelers to Japan. The company has more than 150,000 Wi-Fi hotspots and offers two plans: 900 yen ($8.75) for one week and 1,300 yen for three weeks. Visitors can sign up at http://visitor.docomowifi.com in English, simplified/traditional Chinese and Korean.

SoftBank offers $3.9B in bonds
SoftBank plans to sell bonds for the first time after it dropped plans to merge Sprint with T-Mobile. The operator will offer 400 billion yen ($3.9 billion) in five-year notes to individual investors on 28 August. According to its filing, the coupon will be between 0.95 and 1.55 per cent.

PLDT’s stake in Rocket drops
PLDT’s share in Germany’s Rocket Internet dropped to 8.6 per cent from 10 per cent after a European internet firm invested €435 million for a 10 per cent stake in the firm. United Internet’s investment includes €333 million in cash and the equivalent of €102 million from the company’s participation in the portfolio of Global Founders Capital. PLDT invested €333 million ($444 million) in Rocket.

Telstra taps Ericsson for next-gen network
Telstra announced it will again use Ericsson to supply its optical transport equipment and services. The agreement includes a packet-optical platform from Ciena as well as Ericsson’s software defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualisation (NFV) technology to boost network agility and flexibility.