State of Telecom Industry in Pakistan

The success of iPhone has not only changed the way phone companies and handset makers operate but also impacted other media channels. For instance, companies are now racing to build marketplaces for TV programs that act much like iPhone apps, able to interact with social-networking services, play games, call up movies and other Web content—all using a remote control, rather than a computer equipped with browsers. With PTCL and Wateen in the smart TV game, its only a matter of time before we see more of this.

I previously wrote about some initial steps that Verizon took. with social apps as widgets. Yahoo was also an early contender with a technology for TV applications it calls widgets. The TV applications are designed to exploit new consumer electronics devices with Internet connections that are beginning to appear in homes in significant numbers. More from this article:

Vudu, a startup that offers a streaming movie service; DivX, known for a popular format for storing digital movies; Boxee Inc., which offers software that lets users view Internet content on TVs; Roku, which sells a set-top box for receiving Internet content; and Syabas Technology, which announced a set-top box at CES.

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The SEVP Commercial, PTCL, Mr. Naveed Saeed in an interview with The Nation has hinted on Life Line service to come in future.

The company has been preparing for offering a bouquet of services in the coming days that it had already launched for corporate consumers so far. The bouquet that would be called the ‘Life Line’ would include security, entertainment, infotainment, and high DSL Internet.

Looks like its time to make IP Cameras popular along with IPTV and DSL.

Social media and digital technologies are making way into our living rooms. US telecom company Verizon has introduced a new service on its fiber-based TV service where users can access Twitter and Facebook on their TV. Of course mobile has been a leading channel for social networking and now TV is trying to position itself as another important channel.

One can argue that the demographics which is into social media (youth, professionals and early technology adopters) are not the same who spend much time on TV. On the other hands it could be useful for stay at home women. Only time will tell if this integration is useful and whether it becomes popular or not. Who knows, PTCL may launch this too!

Alcatel-Lucent today announced that Nayatel is preparing to deploy the first gigabit passive optical network (GPON) in Pakistan. This blazing fast network will provide its customers with the most advanced triple-play services – such as high-definition television, innovative telephony services and ultraband Internet access. Nayatel’s Pakistani customers can expect the new network to be up and running by the end of 2009. Wahaj us Siraj, CEO, Nayatel said:

In 2005, Nayatel was the first operator to deploy a fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) network solution in South Asia, and today we have once again pioneered the Pakistani market by becoming the first adopter of GPON technology in the country.

With Alcatel-Lucent’s industry-leading GPON solution, we will be able to offer our customers a whole new range of next-generation, ultraband applications that leverage our network’s true gigabit speeds. All in all, we will soon be able to offer our customers a service experience which was once only dreamed in this part of the world.

“Nayatel’s GPON deployment in Pakistan, will enable their end-users to truly experience the power of next-generation triple-play services,” said Vincenzo Nesci, President of Alcatel-Lucent’s business in the Middle East and Africa. “This contract highlights Nayatel’s continuous confidence in our solutions and expertise,” he adds.

According to the latest MRG IPTV Market Leaders report , Alcatel-Lucent dominates the global IPTV Access market with a 41% market share (four times the market share of its nearest competitor). In its report, MRG confirms that Alcatel-Lucent is the only vendor focusing on all four (geographic) regions, and is deployed in 10 out of the top 25 IPTV service providers worldwide. From an FTTH perspective, Alcatel-Lucent has more than 90 fiber deployments ongoing worldwide, with a mix of GPON and point-to-point roll-outs.

After the deregulation of Pakistan telecom, PTCL was forced to compete with other companies and not only for voice but also for internet and most recently for TV. PTCL competes for triple play with Wateen and Worldcall. IPTV (previously covered here) by PTCL is branded as Smart TV, is all digital and has some interesting features such as Time Shifted Television (TSTV), Search, Electronic Program Guide and Video on demand but these are not exclusive to IPTV.

With regard to prices the smart TV service by PTCL is free till June of 2009. Note that the Smart TV is part of the PTCL Smart Package which bundles TV and broadband (phone line charges are additional). The one-time cost for the set top box is either Rs. 9995 or Rs. 500 per month for 2 years. The monthly cost is Rs. 1500-5300 depending on the broadband package you select. Get more info directly from PTCL’s Customer services at 0800-80-800.

Providing Free Smart TV Services to PTCL Customer till June, 2009 in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad. The free Smart TV includes the following;
* Free BTV Channels
* Free VODs
* Free Set Top Box
* Usual Broadband charges will apply

With a single bill for all three services (phone, dsl and tv), it can be a convenient feature for many families. PTCL has announced that soon it will expand the service to other cities as well. With its broad coverage, many households will have no other choice but PTCL and will be more likely to take the triple play package. However, we at TelecomPk.net feel that Ptcl’s marketing is not effective as their competitors. Even the website design for Smart TV is not that easy to use for people on dial up connections.

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Eager consumers in Pakistan have been waiting for months to get specific details about the pricing and availability of IPTV by PTCL. No official word yet but launch date has been moved several times. Various online forums have been reported a limited trial going on in select cities and PTCL has started advertising IPTV on their website and broadband portals. This teaser website tells you about the “mouth-watering features” but all the links there are non-functional.

I have been using IPTV service by Verizon at my home for a while and I have come to like it. Of course many of the interesting features come with additional price tags. The performance and usability may not be that great in the beginning. As we have talked here in the past triple play is a powerful opportunity for PTCL to stabilize its position — only if it executes well.

There are other practical considerations as well. At telecom grid pakistan, there was a question about how lack of electricity will impact the IPTV service. Well, if you are into personal video recorders, you better arrange for the uninterrupted power supply as well.

See keynote at Wimax world 2007 by Motorola CTO Padmasree Warrior . She talks about the impact of Wimax on both emerging (Pakistan) and mature markets (US, Europe) and about the new on-demand applications which will ride the wave of always on mobile broadband. At a time when Motorola is struggling to regain its leadership position, WiMAX has become critical to Motorola’s future. 

Pakistan is mentioned at 5:20, 9:40 and 13:36.

Thanks to Ajit for the original post at OpenGardens blog.

Adnan Siddiqui pointed out that Wateen has opened pre-registration for their suite of products including WiMAX. For those who have suffered through all the digging on the streets (as in Lahore DHA), this should be welcome news. The link on Wateen’s site mentions that the new site will be the portal for all their services.  The site addresses the 3 major sgements of home, business and operators. Some basic information such as the WiMAX coverage area and technology FAQs are provided there. However as the site stands now, it could use some improvements. Some of the issues I noticed:

1. The approach they are using is to get the customer info through registration and then getting back to them. It means that they are still not ready yet. Now why would people leave their CNIC number with Wateen – especially over an insecure connection? Oh yes here’s an incentive: Be amongst the first 10,000 customers by registering online to receive a surprise gift from Wateen. This offer is valid until 30 September, 2007.
2. The product information is not provided on the registration page. For an ordinary person, more information is desirable with the context. You dont want people to wander around the site to figure out what options are availabel for TV – you put that info right there where users need it. 
3. The site does not list information about the WiMAX packages and prices. For example the business WiMAX section greets you with a “coming soon” message.The package rate inforamtoion is likely to be available in 4-6 weeks according to Wateen.
4. Site navigation is not very user-friendly and easy to bookmark.

 Why do companies have a hard time putting together an informative and user-friendly site which will help consumer become their customers? What’s so difficult about it?

This post is first in a series in which IPTV services in Pakistan will be discussed.  First an introduction to IPTV: in simple terms IPTV is television content that, instead of being delivered through traditional formats and cabling, is received by the viewer through the technologies (IP) used for computer networks. IPTV provides multimedia services via a broadband connection with the help of a set-top box (STB) which resembles a traditional cable box. A single connection (fiber optic, copper or cable) coming to your premise can serve phone, TV and Internet service – terms such as FTTH or FTTP are used when fiber optic cable is being used for higher bandwidth transmission.

Why IPTV? IPTV is an imporant piece of the Triple Play puzzle. Many telecom companies are using it to create a sticky bundle for customers, the idea is that if a customer gets all services from a provider he or she can be offered a better deal and therefore is less likely to switch providers. I, for one, use bundles at home and find it convenient to have one bill and one phone number for customer service.

Triple play is also great for offering enhanced and converged services (not all are feasible, though) such as :

• TV and video services such as video-on-demand (VoD), subscription, live TV channel lineup packaging and scheduling, and network-based digital video recorder capabilities
• Additional “blended” communications applications such as get an alert of phone call on your TV, text chat, live traffic information (even using your cell phone as a remote – seriously!)
• Personal media applications such as uploading of photographs and video clips and sharing of music and video content across multiple in-home devices

What is the situation of IPTV in Pakistan’s market today? It is all about broadband availability and affordability and till now Pakistan has miserably lagged behind on this. I am hopeful that things will change for better in the next 2-4 years. The policy and regulatory framework is set by PTA. Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) monitors and regulates the electronic media and it issues IPTV licneces as well.  I know about the following companies which can/will offer IPTV: PTCL, Wateen and Nayatel. There is little information available about PTCL plans (see some discussion here) but it is likely that they will offer IPTV over DSL using technologies from various foreign vendors (see below); for Wateen I’ve previously written here. Recently Brain has also advertised limited launch of IPTV service.

According to some resources PTCL may launch IPTV service on 23rd March 2007 to pilot users -with a broader launch to 20,000 subscribers in the first half of this year. In terms of its strategy IPTV must be a top priority for PTCL. It all comes to execution and creating a value package. PTCL launch is supported by Chinese telecom equipment giant Huawei and Irdeto, the Netherlands-based content security company. Huawei will provide the servers and set-top boxes (see Hua wei’s IPTV architecture below) and Irdeto will provide content security solution.

The Irdeto IPTV security solution integrated into the Huawei IPTV system provides for a full video product and service offering, including broadcast TV, video on demand, PVR and Time Shift TV. Within the Irdeto IPTV security framework, content is securely stored and distributed across any broadband IP network and the corresponding content rights can be managed on an individual subscriber and/or device basis.

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As this post is being written, ITU is hosting TELECOM WORLD 2006 Asia in Hong Kong. It is one of the leading events of the telecom world, “bringing the world’s leading ICT companies, decision-makers, organisations and governments together, Telecom WORLD features a major exhibition, a high-level Forum and numerous opportunities for meeting, discussing, networking and getting business done.”

One of the most interesting part of this event is the Forum where leaders (see a few leading speakers below) get together and discuss the technical, economic, social and policy matters surrounding telecommunications and ICT in general. The theme for this forum is Living the Digital World which seems quite appropriate given the fast-paced changes digital technology is making in the world.

There are many hot topics in the agenda such as broadband triple play, digital content, Wimax etc. While each of the above topic merits in-depth discussions, I’d like to point out to one of the most important subject for the world today: Next Generation networks for Development. The decisions of today will impact how tens millions of people in developing countries with low income levels can join this information revolution. In my opinion, telecommunication related technologies have a vast potential to change these people’s lives.

In the ITU conference the Telecommunication Development Symposium will cover how telecommunication can enhance development. More information about this theme is here. Excerpts below:

Developing countries have made tremendous strides towards increasing connectivity by using fixed, wireless and mobile technologies. At the same time, there is wide consensus that the next phase of networked communications will be based upon Next Generation Network technologies that promise to achieve enhanced connectivity through cost-effective and sustainable infrastructure development and management.

The concept of the Next Generation Network (NGN) covers the transition from current to future packet-based infrastructures, which is essential to take advantage of new opportunities for development and to bridge the digital divide. It spans both the fixed and wireless worlds so that the same services can be delivered no matter what access technology is used — whether it is a mobile device, a fixed network broadband connection or a fixed wireless connection. As a result, NGNs promise to foster the use of communications for greater socio-economic development, including E-education, E-health, and E-government, and enable countries to boost productivity and growth.

Participants and attendees will learn what NGNs look like, which NGN applications can succeed in developing countries, whether existing business and regulatory models will be applicable, and whether developing countries can move beyond existing technologies to a state-of-the-art wireless NGN world. They will also discuss what kinds of handsets and devices will be most appropriate, how end users will pay for broadband services such as IPTV, VoIP and e-health services in an NGN environment, and what kind of NGN policy developing countries should embark upon.

I hope that after this conference a concrete action plan is published and follwed so that we can see some results and its not all talk. The representatives of developing countries need to take the lead on this.