SA Goverment Struggles with Private Investment, like SEACOM

Johannesburg

THE government's attitude to private sector investment in infrastructure is becoming ever more bizarre.

It complains that the private sector is not coming to the infrastructure party. But as soon as private sector operators show their willingness to invest billions of rands in any kind of network infrastructure that SA desperately needs, the government hastens to put obstacles in place that seem aimed at driving private sector investors away. Even more bizarre is that if the private sector comes along with huge sums to invest, in a new fuel pipeline or an undersea telecommunications cable, the government says, in effect: "No, don't you do that, we want it for ourselves." After all, why should local and international financiers pay when SA's taxpayers can be hit for the money instead?

The tangled undersea cable story is the latest instance of this peculiar approach to the world. There can be no question that SA and Africa desperately need more bandwidth to connect to the outside world, or that it needs to be a lot cheaper than what we have now if telecommunications costs in this country are to come down to anything close to an international norm.

And it is urgent: not only is the dearth of international bandwidth holding back the development of industries such as the call-centre industry, but there's also the 2010 Soccer World Cup to contend with, not to mention the prospect that SA may win the tender for the bandwidth-hungry international telescope, SKA ( square kilometre array).

The Rest @ AllAfrica.com

Neotel Promisses Cheap Broadband in South Africa After SEACOM Arrives

Jani Meyer
August 19 2007 at 12:04PM

Access to cheap broadband in South Africa is no longer a pipe-dream, after multi-billion-dollar deals were signed to construct underwater cables connecting the East Coast of Africa to India and Italy.

Neotel, the second fixed-line operator in the country, said the project would be up and running by early 2009 and it would slash Telkom’s prices.
Telkom controls the ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) and the local loop that links homes to the telecommunications exchanges in South Africa.

The “connecting” plant of Neotel will be at Mtunzini in Northern KwaZulu-Natal.
The Seacom (Sea Cable System) is being developed at a cost of more than $550-million (R3,8-billion).

The Rest from Telekoms & Providers, South Africa

EASSy Cable costs more per Kilometer the SEACOM

Kenya: Eassy Investors to Pay More for Fibre Optic Cable

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Business Daily (Nairobi)

17 August 2007Posted to the web 16 August 2007

Okuttah Mark

Investors in the South Africa-fronted undersea fibre optic cable will pay the highest price for its construction, signalling the fact that accessing it may cost as much.
Telecommunications experts said construction of the East African Submarine System (EASSy) will cost investors Sh2,000 more per kilometre than the building of East African Marines System (TEAMS) and private sector-driven SEACOM.

People familiar with the matter told the Business Daily that while the laying of the EASSy undersea cable has been priced at $26,161 per kilometre, TEAMS and SEACOM will spend only $23,275 and $23, 076 per kilometre espectively.
The high cost of constructing EASSy is seen to be particularly burdensome to investors because the project managers recently declined a co-building offer from SEACOM- the South African firm that plans to build an undersea cable along the same route.
Such a partnership would have allowed each party to own individual fibre pairs on the desired route while making significant saving through sharing of key facilities such as repeaters, landing and power stations.

Senior telecoms industry officials have previously indicated that it would cost EASSy customers $500 mega bites a month in bandwidth- more than twice the cost of bandwidth in India where the cost stands at $200 mega bites a month.

Simon Olawo of the EASSy secretariat says the cost of laying out cables is mainly determined by the distance covered, equipment installed, the number of landing stations and tax payable to respective governments.

Plans by EASSy initiative to construct and operate a submarine fibre optic cable along the Eastern coast of Africa has faced a number of hurdles, including disagreement over the mode of access.

The cable, which will cover the longest distance, is expected to have an initial equipped capacity of 20 gegabits per second and an ultimate capacity of 320 gegabits/second. It will run from South Africa to Sudan through Mozambique, Madagascar, Tanzania, Kenya, Somali and Djibouti.
TEAMS, a partnership between the Kenya government and the United Arab Emirates telecom company Etisalat, will connect Mombasa to Fujairah in the Gulf of Oman. The total cost of the project that is expected to be complete by end of next year is $110 million.

The Government has 40 per cent stake in the project while Etisalat has 20, leaving the other 40 per cent to local private investors. During this year's budget, the Government allocated Sh1billion for the project and has been on an agressive hunt for private investors.

The International submarine cable industry has been growing at unprecedented pace. Several projects are under way, with two being undertaken between US and China while the other is between US and Australia- with three projects for Africa and two from the Caribbean to US.
With ongoing number of projects and taking into account that only three companies have the ability to manufacture and construct the cables, namely Alcatel, NEC and Tyco, meeting aggressive time line for some of the project such as Teams might be difficult.

Business Daily (Nairobi)

Safaricom

Fri 10 Aug 2007, 11:04 GMT

By Helen Nyambura-Mwaura

NAIROBI, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Kenya's leading mobile phone firm expects profit this year to be in line with last year and is targeting 9 million subscribers by the end of March from 7.3 million now, its head said on Friday.

Safaricom, jointly owned by Kenya's government and Britain's Vodafone posted pre-tax profit of 17.19 billion shillings ($258.6 million) in the year to March 31, the highest posted by any company in the east African country.

"We expect this year to be as good as, if not better, than last year," Chief Executive Officer Michael Joseph told Reuters in an interview.

"We have 7.3 million subscribers right now, and we will be over 9 million by the end of our financial year. That's our target."

Joseph said he was confident the operator would maintain its lead and expand market share despite the planned entry of a third mobile firm in 2008.

full article from Reuters Africa

Community Wireless Resource Centre (CWRC) Being installed in Uganda

In July 2007, community wireless networks were implemented at telecentres in Lira and Nabweru by the Community Wireless Resource Centre (CWRC).

The CWRC team included CWRC staff and four electrical engineering students who are doing industrial training under CWRC. This intervention arose out of :

• the need to reduce the high cost of internet connectivity at IDRC-supported telecentres in Uganda,
• to explore optimal connectivity models such as sharing the existing bandwidth with neighboring institutions via outdoor wireless networks
• to provide internet access to these partners without need for heavy initial investments in satellite hardware and subscriptions.

It is anticipated that these networks will enhance sustainability of internet access at these telecentres.

In Lira, a total of three partners have been connected to the telecentre wirelessly and can now access the internet at their premises.

In Nabweru, a total of three partners have also been connected.

The CWRC team now heads to Kabale to implement similar wireless networks in Kabale town and Kachwekano (which is located approximately 8 km from Kabale town).

The design of these networks considers the telecentre to be the hub of the network where all other sites are connected. In cases where line of sight links to the telecentre are not possible, connection between the hub and the partner site is accomplished via a repeater. Therefore, in this arrangement, the telecentre acts as a wireless internet access point to its partners.

The Rest @ Telecentre

Neotel Gets Exclusive Seacom Landing Rights

Neotel has secured the exclusive landing rights for the $550 million (R3.8 billion) Sea Cable System (Seacom), which aims to reduce internet costs by 80 percent.Seacom is a privately funded cable that will connect south and east Africa to Europe and India.The Seacom cable system routes will pass along the east coast of Africa and through the Red Sea before terminating in Italy. In addition, it will land in Mozambique, Madagascar, Tanzania, Kenya and the United Arab Emirates.

Construction starts later this month for the cable to be operational in 2009. - Thabiso Mochiko, Johannesburg

Source: Business Report South Africa

Africa's Own Satellite

The West Africa Development Bank (BOAD), is to partner with RASCOM, Africa's Regional Organisation of Satellite Communication to launch Africa's first satellite in orbit to give coverage to the whole continent.

Up to now all satellite communication in orbit are dominated by the West. The result that African operators of satellite networks to African homes pay exhorbitant prices for such services. According to industry analysts, a satellite giving coverage to the African continent is in line with the migration of all broadcast signals by 2015 from analogue to digital.

The project is expected to cost about 1.6 billion FCFA (1 600 000 000). The partnership was signed on behalf of BOAD and RASCOM by Issa Coulibaly Interim President of BOAD and Jones Killimbe Head of Rascom. RASCOM is expected to contribute finance, design, construction, orbit placement and launching expertise to the project..

"BOAD gives a strong signal to the whole of the African institutions to join and to take their part in a project which challenges any African, to control the communication under technological conditions of point" said Issa Coulibaly during the signing ceremony. .

The project aims at offering modern services of telecommunications to millions of people who currently do not profit from basic telecommunications services. In order to improve accessibility to telecommunications, Africans themselves must invest in these projects. A satellite giving coverage to the African continent will not only improve telecommunication services in the continent but will also make sure that digital satellite broadcasting services are accessible to the majority of Africans.

Established in 1992, RASCOM is made up of forty five member states. Its first PanAfrican system of telecommunications satellite was named RASCOM-1 and will be launched on December 1, 2007 from the space port of Europe in Kourou in French Guiana.RASCOM-1 will contribute to the fight to bridge the communications gap between the rural and the urban areas and also enhance Africa's economic development in general and in particular the integration of Africa.

RASCOM-1 will will be available on Kuband and C band. The satellite will weigh approximately 3.200 kg, and will have a power of 6.4 kw at the end of the lifetime and will be positioned at 2,85 degrees

The Rest @ MY Broadband