Archive for August 20th, 2008

Mobile Subscriber Growth Takes A Hit In July 2008

Published by Babar Bhatti on August 20, 2008 under Business, Companies, Economy, Emerging Markets Telecom, Government Regulations, Mobile Phones, Mobilink, Networks, Pakistan, Telecommunications, Telenor, Ufone, Wireless, Zong

Crackdown on SIM registration, increase in taxes, inflation and worsening economy, political uncertainty and other factors took a big toll on the telecom sector. The July growth numbers (~1.3M) are the lowest so far in 2008. Even though the pace in growth has slowed, companies like Zong and Ufone are doing well albeit with with low ARPU which has been a consistent factor in Pakistan market.

Where do the companies stand on market share? Compared with 2007 end, Mobilink lost 4%, Zong gained 2%.

If you are interested in the actual numbers, see the data – as always reported by PTA.

LUMS Research On Boosting Bandwidth Featured In MIT Technology Magazine

Published by Babar Bhatti on August 20, 2008 under Broadband Internet, Business, ICT, Information Technology, Infrastructure, Pakistan, Research, Telecommunications

September edition of the MIT Technology Review has featured the work of Umar Saif, a professor at LUMS, on improving Internet connectivity in the developing-world. The Project, dubbed DonateBandwidth, is a follow-up project of Poor Man’s Broadband work which I wrote about previously. Our congratulations to Dr. Saif and the team.

Umar shared his thoguhts in an e-mail:

With DonateBandwidth, users in the developing-world can help each other by donating their unused bandwidth to those who need it. This project received funding from the US State Department/NAS and HEC and will be further developed in collaboration with UC Berkeley.

It is rare that research in Pakistan catches the attention of a publication like the Technology Review; I am told this is the first time MIT Technology Review has featured a research project in LUMS.

Here is an excerpt of the article “Spare Some Bandwidth?”

nternet access is growing steadily in developing nations, but limited infrastructure means that at times connections can still be painfully slow. A major bottleneck for these countries is the need to force a lot of traffic through international links, which typically have relatively low bandwidth.

Now computer scientists in Pakistan are building a system to boost download speeds in the developing world by letting people effectively share their bandwidth. Software chops up popular pages and media files, allowing users to grab them from each other, building a grassroots Internet cache.

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