Singtel says A&G’s Christina Ong still qualifies as independent director due to transitional period

CHRISTINA Ong, an independent director of Singtel , is still eligible to be retained in her role despite exceeding nine years of service this year, due to a transitional period implemented by the Singapore Exchange.

Singtel disclosed this in a bourse filing on Sunday (Jul 23), in response to a shareholder query ahead of its upcoming annual general meeting (AGM) on why Ong is still being retained as a director.

Ong is chairman and a senior partner of law firm Allen & Gledhill. She joined Singtel as an independent director in April 2014. Under a new rule introduced in January, SGX introduced a nine-year tenure limit for independent directors, exceeding which the director must resign or be designated as “non-independent”.

However, the deadline for this is no later than the AGM for the financial year ending on or after Dec 31, 2023, Singtel said in its filing. The company’s 2023 financial year had concluded in March.

“Therefore, on the recommendation of the corporate governance and nominations committee of the company, the board continues to consider Mrs Ong to be an independent director,” Singtel said.

Queries on strategy, SingPost

The company also addressed several other shareholder queries on its business strategy and investments.

One shareholder asked how Singtel’s new infrastructure unit, Digital InfraCo, could better unlock the latent value of the telco’s assets.

Singtel in April announced the formation of Digital InfraCo to house its regional data centre business, subsea cable and satellite carrier businesses. The unit will also include Paragon, Singtel’s platform for 5G and cloud-related technology.

The company said that grouping these assets under Digital InfraCo “will allow it to be valued at its proper market value, instead of the telco multiples it is trading under today”. This gives Singtel the option to “illuminate the value” of the assets should opportunities arise.

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Singtel also outlined its strategy for the data centre business, with demand for data storage expected to surge with the rise of generative artificial intelligence.

It has three key projects: It will be breaking ground on a 58 MW data centre in Tuas in the coming months, and is also building 17 MW and 20 MW data centres in Indonesia and Thailand, respectively.

“The three projects, which double our data centre capacity when operational in 2025, will help us capture greater growth and further entrench our position as the region’s leading sustainable data centre player,” Singtel said.

The company is exploring more data centre opportunities in other regional markets, including Malaysia and Vietnam.

Separately, Singtel addressed a query on whether the decline in the market value of its associate SingPost has any financial impact. In response, Singtel said that SingPost’s contribution is “not significant” to the group.

It added: “We constantly review our portfolio of assets and are open to monetising assets that do not fit in with our strategy or if we feel will lead to greater shareholder value.”

Singtel shares closed at S$2.60 last Friday, up 1.2 per cent.