The latest PR affirms State Bank of Pakistan and PTA are closely working on a unified policy for mobile banking that will connect all banks of the country with cellular mobile operators for mobile transactions. No mentions about where the existing mobile banking framework will stand with it.
While browsing the easypaisa facebook fanpage, I got a chance to see watch a TVC, by far the best one I have seen so far. It is a Telenor commercial about an eassy on “The Future” written a by school going girl in early days of telephone.
If you thought that the mobile companies in our part of the world fight over ads and claims of better service or coverage, watch this. Two giant telecom firms, Verizon and AT&T pointing fingers at each other – this is fun. For more on the story and the lawsuit read this.
Zumbeel played a wonderful part to get top notch telecom industry professionals to speak on trending technology topics at their event ‘Are You Online’.
One of them was Mr.Ahmer Arsalan, Customer Solution Manager from NSN (Pakistan and Middle East). He has worked as a subject matter expert for network planning and also on various projects mainly Greenfield networks and 3G/HSPA in Europe, UK, Middle East and Africa. He delivered a presentation on the most heated topic in our telecom industry, ‘3G and Pakistan’, calling it Pakis3Gstan.
We have been debating a lot on 3G here, its upgrade paths and benefits. We also looked at the other side of the picture, how we can grow on our data services. At once it seemed that the 3G license was just on the edge with PTA conducting workshop on it and promising to support the technology. Now its almost a year now, nothing have happened and the licenses are still not auctioned.
A recent poll on the frequency of use of GPRS/EDGE services among consumers revealed that data services users are few but increasing.
One thing is very clear, the mobile data usage can never match the voice usage. But I believe it still has a lot of room to grow. The operators with their attention on the voice users should also focus on the data services. We still lack in making the data services known to common masses. Operators can play a pivotal role here in awareness of the mobile data services.
When mobile phones came consumers were already aware of telephonic voice services and voice going mobile was appreciated by all and thus mobile gained popularity. But when SMS entered the market it wasn’t much appreciated because consumer were not really aware of its potential. In fact SMS was rarely used and was costly. But then some steps like making it free for limited time, reducing the cost, bringing in unlimited usage packages (bundles) made SMS an invincible necessity.
Now we have the GPRS/EDGE based data services which are not known by a majority of mobile users. The operators need to run a campaign first to educate the consumers of the potential use of data services and then make these services accessible for all.
A few ways I think this can be done:
All the latest mobile set support the mobile data services, awareness will make the little shift in the mind-sets needed to boost these data services which will make room for 3G services.
Cross post from Basit Ali’s blog
PTA has recently announced that it plans to launch 3G services in Pakistan very soon. Though no dates or time frame has been given and the word soon remains undefined. According to this news-release, launching 3G services is one of the steps it is taking to keep the upward trends in telecom growth, a sector that is already contributing 2% of the GDP and it is expected that it will grow up to 3% in the coming years.
My question is, that a country with a tele-density of 62%, mobile penetration of 94 million subscribers with a population of around 180 million, can we still expect more subscribers to sign up?
I believe we are already reaching a kind of saturation point. Please consider the following facts before answering my question:
We did talk earlier on the possibility of Nokia entering into Netbooks. So today Nokia has unveiled its netbook “Booklet 3G”.
Specs and features of Booklet 3G known so far are:
The detailed specifications and price details are being held so far and will be announce at Nokia World to be held on Sep 2, 2009.
Cellphone operators have finally decided to approach the finance ministry to seek withdrawal of the recently imposed 20 paisa tax per SMS, which will hinder growth of the industry.
It is learnt that cellular phone operators have started evolving a strategy and are preparing to make a presentation to the finance ministry in this regard. Before going to the ministry, top officials of cellular phone companies will separately meet with each other in a couple of days to make their case strong. Officers of one of the operators are also considering to approach the Competition Commission, as, according to them, the government has offered extra support to one of the companies at the cost of the whole industry.
The government, in the federal budget for 2009-10, has levied 20 paisa tax per SMS, which is in addition to the rate specified for the telecommunication sector. At present, all mobile phone companies except one are offering bulk SMS packages, which are seen greatly favourable for consumers. However, the new levy will reduce revenues of operators, and rates charging process will also become complex as most of the operators are offering unlimited SMS at a fixed rate.
According to data collected from the industry, out of 90 million registered cellular phone customers, over 45 million use the SMS service, each sending an average of seven SMS daily. Daily SMS traffic in the country is estimated at around 315 million and monthly traffic at around one billion.
The Pakistani market is very responsive to SMS-based packages. There has been tremendous growth in SMS usage, estimated at 30 per cent in recent years.
[via business recorder]
We are already late as 3G has been introduced in the rest of the world, including a few of our neighbours including India. How can we look forward to 3G services in Pakistan when the basic data service “SMS” is being taxed more than its cost? Government should have discussed such a decision with PTA before announcing it in the Budget 2009. PTA should take a strong stand on this motion as this will hinder growth in the Telecom industry of Pakistan.
As the number of Pakistani cell phone users reaches 91,008,042, the United Nations (UN) has rated Pakistan one of the fastest growing country across the globe in the telecommunications sector.
The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) says that the tele-density in Pakistan is 56.50 per cent while Pakistan generated 763 million text messages during 2008/09 and stood fourth for SMS traffic in Asia Pacific.
According to the recently released UN report, more than 60 per cent of the world’s citizens have access to mobile phones; that is 4.1 billion cellular subscribers across the world.
The report adds that mobile phones help developing countries to improve their economy. That is a well established fact by now. However, a more relevant question is how the governments can either support this growth or cause it to slowdown.
Of course, political stability and lack of security is the overriding factor above all for the economy.
An excerpt from the UN report
Some developing countries, though, have moved up considerably in the Index over the five-year period, including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, China and Viet Nam. This is partly due to high mobile cellular growth, coupled with an increase in Internet users. China (Rank 73 in 2007 up from 90 in 2002), has made significant progress in increasing the number of fixed telephone lines and mobile subscriptions as well as fixed broadband during the past few years. The recent Government decision to issue IMT-2000/3G licenses by early 2009 and to restructure the market to increase competition in the wired and wireless services is likely to drive mobile broadband and further increase ICT uptake in other areas as well.
[Via The News]
The wireless panorama is changing at a high-speed. Starting with the 1st Generation of communication networks (1G) in the early 80s and many evolutions we now have 4th Generation to talk about. In the last 3 years we have seen the deployments of 3G networks and most recently the work on 4G is on the peak.
From 1G to 4G we have seen changes in the modulation schemes, duplexing methods, multiple access technologies, data rate, speech coding, antenna systems and other aspects which have played a role to make communication efficient over the period of time.
But the question remains, do we need them? So much of an advancement of technology, has it really given us benefit in terms of both services and economics (cost) ?
Let’s take a look at each generation.
1st Generation (1G) had the famous AMPS standard. It offered basic voice services with cost being high initially but went down with time.
2nd Generation (2G) is well known for the GSM technology. It started off with offering digital voice services and then we had the short message service (SMS). The 2G changed the lives of many, it became impossible to live without a cell phone. Initially these services came with costs not in the range of average consumer but still gained popularity and the cost went down with time. Earlier a call received was charged, but today we have SMS packages, Friends and Family offer, One Free number offer and many more.
Then came the evolutions of 2G, we saw high speed data links on GPRS or EDGE. This laid the foundation of mobile internet. Once again the initial costs were high and it offered limited services. This evolution raised many questions on its actual need. Why need mobile internet with limited services when we have broadband or dial-ups at offices and homes? Although, these services are not as popular as SMS, but with time they have captured a small proportion of the population. Businesses today rely heavily on GPRS/EDGE to get online to check emails and act upon them immediately. Social networks are fast expanding on GPRS/EDGE, examples include facebook and twitter. With all this happening the cost again has gone down.
I would leave this post here for discussions and continue it later.
At one end the demand of mobile broadband is increasing and so is the need of 3G and B3G (Beyond 3G), where as at the other end operators as well as consumers have shown reluctance to go 3G. Operators resist in the deployment of 3G as they have invested heavily in existing air-interface infrastructure, while for consumers the cost of using 3G services is high.
As we had discussed earlier in the Evolution towards HSDPA, the migration strategy along the road to the 3G and beyond should be “soft” network evolution that does not render existing installations superfluous. The solutions to this comes as NSN unveils plans for Flexi Multiradio base stations.
As reported in a press release,
Nokia Siemens Networks has today made the evolution path from 2G and 3G to LTE faster, greener and more cost-effective than ever with the launch of Flexi Multiradio Base Station. Building on the company’s market leading Flexi Base Station platform, the new Multiradio Flexi expands its supported technologies to cover GSM/EDGE, WCDMA/HSPA and LTE – all running concurrently in a single unit.
Flexi Multiradio Base Station meets the needs of new and existing 2G and 3G operators who can use their existing infrastructure to deploy new network-wide technologies via simple software upgrade to 3G or LTE. The flexibility of a true multiradio base station removes the risk from balancing investments made in 2G, 3G and LTE, providing operators with future-proof options. The new Multiradio Flexi is also backward compatible with current Flexi Base Station, enabling capacity upgrades to existing Base Station sites.The product also fits CDMA operators who intend to migrate to WCDMA/HSPA or LTE.
For operators coping with cost challenges, running multiple radio technologies in a single Base Station means reduced OPEX from fewer site visits, simplified logistics, reduced maintenance and a smaller requirement for trained staff. The possibility to reuse GSM sites for WCDMA and HSPA also delivers savings from reduced rental costs and maximized reuse of existing infrastructure.
“Flexi Multiradio Base Station makes network evolution faster, greener and more cost-efficient than ever, and this launch makes Nokia Siemens Networks the only vendor which enables future technology evolution steps exactly with the same hardware without radio technology specific boards. Thanks to the industry’s highest degree of integration, Flexi Multiradio Base Station is able to provide three technologies in one compact 3 sector Base Station of less than 75 liters”, said Marc Rouanne, head of the company’s Radio Access business.
Superior energy efficiency – a key feature of Flexi Base Stations – is further improved in Flexi Multiradio. The new Base Station has the lowest energy consumption in the market. An average 3 sector Base Station site running simultaneously GSM/EDGE and WCDMA/HSPA consumes as little as 790W, whilst pushing an impressive 60W output per sector for maximum capacity and coverage. The small and lightweight product is also rugged enough for outdoor use without shelters or air conditioning, further minimising their environmental impact.
“We are very pleased to see Nokia Siemens Networks take concrete steps towards fulfilment of the targets agreed in the context of WWF’s Climate Savers programme” said Jean-Paul Jeanrenaud, Director of Corporate Relations at WWF International. “This is a good example of how technological innovation can contribute to improved energy efficiency and profitability, while reducing a company’s ecological footprint. The fight against climate change requires all the ingenuity and commitment that the corporate sector has to offer”.
Flexi Multiradio Base Station features built-in IP/Ethernet connectivity for a unified transport network for the Single RAN. Operators can also benefit from using the common NetAct network management system for planning, optimising and operating the Single RAN. For example, NetAct Optimizer enables easy and high quality refarming of WCDMA or LTE in current GSM 900 MHz frequency band.
Deployments of this new Flexi Multiradio Base Station will start from the beginning of 2010 onwards.
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