Latest news with #Brekke
The Star
23-05-2025
- Business
- The Star
Thai telecom giant True faces major trust test after nationwide network outage
BANGKOK: On Thursday (May 22) morning, users of the True Corporation Plc's network across Thailand experienced a sudden and widespread service outage, affecting both mobile phone and home internet services in several areas. The outage, which continued into the afternoon, caused major disruptions to work, communications, and online transactions. The hashtag #ทรูล่ม (True down) quickly began trending on social media, reflecting not just a technical failure but a growing crisis of confidence for one of Thailand's largest telecom providers. True Corporation and Total Access Communication (DTAC) had previously completed Southeast Asia's largest telecom merger, forming a combined market capitalization of approximately 294 billion baht. At the time, True's top executives promised that the merger would create "endless opportunities" and immediate benefits for customers of both networks. True positioned itself as a network leader, aiming to cover 98% of the Thai population with 5G by 2026, while continuing nationwide network expansion. The merged entity officially registered under the name True Corporation Public Company Limited on March 1, 2023. This week marks the second anniversary of the merger. Sigve Brekke, Group CEO of True Corporation, stated that the company has allocated a 28- to 30-billion-baht budget for network expansion in 2025. "Two years into the merger, we have seen the combined strength of the two organizations drive solid and sustainable growth," he said. True has now laid out three core missions: Building a trusted brand, developing AI innovations for all Thais, and fostering a customer-centric organisational culture. 'True has become a dominant player in Thailand's telecommunications market — both in mobile and broadband. My goal is to make True a trusted and loved brand for everyone,' Brekke added. - The Nation/ANN
Local Norway
21-02-2025
- Business
- Local Norway
Norway's immigration office vows to cut citizenship application backlog
At the end of 2024, the Norwegian Directorate of Immigration (UDI) had just under 20,000 citizenship applications waiting for a response. Around 80 percent of the citizenship applications waiting for a decision at the end of last year had applied in 2023 and 2024, while the remaining applicants has applied during or before 2022. The UDI has set itself the goal of reducing the backlog of cases waiting for an answer by the end of the year. 'Our goal is to process more cases than the number of applications received in 2025, but internal reallocation of resources and external factors may affect how many applicants receive a decision this year. We are constantly working to improve and streamline our processes,' Per-Jan Brekke, team leader in the UDI's press office, told The Local. Progress on cutting the waiting list had already been made in 2024, when the UDI received 21,700 applications for citizenship but managed to process 25,700 in total. The UDI said that it hoped that its applications system would be improved throughout 2025 but that a new and improved IT system the government has invested in wouldn't be rolled out this year. 'The immigration sector is working on renewing our systems. In the citizenship department at UDI, we have a partly modernised platform and will further improve our processes throughout 2025 and coming years, but we do not plan to introduce a new case processing solution in 2025,' Brekke said. 'In the long term, this [the new IT system] will lead to shorter waiting times, but we do not believe the development work in 2025 will have a significant impact on waiting times,' he added. Citizenship cases are either fully or partially automated at the UDI. Cases that are fully automated typically receive an answer within a few weeks or a couple of months of handing in their application, while others wait in excess of two years for an answer. At the time of writing, the current waiting time for Norwegian citizenship for most foreign nationals was on average around 30 months. Applications that can't be handled automatically are assigned to a caseworker. The UDI has previously told The Local that caseworkers processed a mix of new and older cases – with older cases being more time-consuming due to factors such as missing paperwork. The directorate recently said that a drop-off in the number of people being granted citizenship between 2023 and 2024 was due to a mix of fewer applicants and less staff available to handle the applications, many of which still have to be done manually.
