To boost Iloilo City’s bid to be one of the country’s best urbanized cities, PLDT wireless subsidiary Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart) signed an agreement with City Government under Mayor Jerry Treñas to deploy free WiFi services via Google Station across key public areas.

These cover City Hall, Esplanade, Cultural Heritage Tourism Zones of Jaro Plaza, Molo Plaza and Plaza Libertad Complex and district plazas.

“Through this partnership with Iloilo City, we aim to further boost the efforts of Mayor Treñas and his team in levelling up Iloilo into one of the country’s premier cities, and support the local government’s various programs to uplift the quality of life of its citizens through enhanced public safety and security, education, health, and livelihood services,” said PLDT Chief Revenue Officer and Smart President and CEO Alfredo S. Panlilio.

“Our continuing roll-out of Google Station nationwide is a testament to PLDT-Smart’s sustained efforts in making high-quality and reliable connectivity available to more Filipinos across the country,” said Juan Victor I. Hernandez, Senior Vice President and Head of Enterprise for PLDT and Smart.

“We look forward to working with Iloilo City government in serving Ilonggos with fast, free and open Wi-Fi connections in City Hall, as well as in cultural heritage tourism spots across the city,” he added.

Once up, these Iloilo venues will join the growing list of 600 Google Station sites nationwide that Smart and Google Philippines initially announced in July 2019.

To date, the Smart-powered Wi-Fi service is already available in government offices like city and provincial halls, as well as in regional offices of National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) and Land Transportation Office (LTO).

Google Station is also available in other heavy foot-traffic areas such as airports and other transportation hubs like bus stations and seaports, hospitals, tertiary schools, and malls.

This complements Smart’s ongoing network expansion and modernization program across the Philippines.

For 2019, PLDT capex is expected to reach P78.4 billion, including allocations for the expansion of PLDT’s fiber broadband service, which also supports Smart’s mobile network by providing high-capacity links for cellular base stations.Iloilo City PIO