The Digital Economy and Society (DES) Ministry is working with CAT Telecom and TOT to provide a joint 12-month fixed broadband internet package with zero charges for the first three months as part of public assistance during the pandemic.
The package is meant to help people who have not yet subscribed to home internet packages to support working from home.
The package cost will be 390 baht per month. Subscribers only have to pay for nine months.
The connection speed will be 100 megabits per second for download and 50 Mbps for upload.
Those interested can sign up from May 10 to July 31, said DES Minister Buddhipongse Punnakanta.
No charges will be applied for installation and related equipment costs under the package.
"TOT and CAT have prepared for 100,000 subscriptions under the package," Mr Buddhipongse said.
The DES Ministry will consider extending the payment-free period from three months if the pandemic continues to pose a threat, he said.
The package was designed for people working from home and students studying online during this hard time, Mr Buddhipongse said.
CAT president Sanphachai Huvanandana said CAT Telecom and TOT both have sufficient network capacity nationwide to cater to package users efficiently.
There are 7 million households in the country subscribing to home internet packages. Of them, 200,000 subscribe to CAT Telecom, 1.5 million to TOT, 2 million to Triple T Broadband and more than 3 million to True Corporation.
According to Mr Buddhipongse, the joint package is an initiative of TOT and CAT Telecom. The two state enterprises are set to merge into a new company, National Telecom (NT).
The DES minister said the merger is likely to be delayed by six months from July 14 as originally planned because of disruption from the pandemic.
Mr Buddhipongse said he will seek a cabinet resolution to defer the timeline of the merger, the process of which is being hampered by paperwork between the two enterprises and foreign creditors.
Other proceedings, including legal, financial and workforce preparations, have progressed.
The minister said he urged the two state enterprises to work hard on the merger plan and they should attach importance to 5G services.
"TOT has been assigned to turn existing service centres into 5G service centres to cater to nationwide 5G adoption," Mr Buddhipongse said.
The DES Ministry has formed 13 panels working on merger procedures and hired a consultant for 30 million baht to study legal, human resource, financial and strategy aspects of the merger.