Telecoms, internet in Pakistan

By Syed Fazl-e-Haider

QUETTA, Pakistan - Telekom Malaysia announced this week that the company is set to complete its US$100 million countrywide fiber-optic-backbone project in Pakistan - the largest fiber-optic network in the country - by October.

In February 2005, Telekom Malaysia announced a joint-venture fiber-optic-backbone project with Multinet, a licensed provider of electronic information and data-network operation services in Pakistan. Its activities include local loop and other value-added services, such as broadband, wireless broadband and allied services. The deal was concluded in April 2005. Through its international arm, TM International, it has telecom investments in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Cambodia, with evolving plans to expand into other parts of Asia.

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Of course PTCL has 1700Mbps of unused (spare, hoarded, unsold) bandwidth coming in off FLAG and the SE-ME-WEs. Reducing the wholesale price would mean using this, surely that way lies madness…..

PTA is still focussing on buying bandwidth when the time has come to start creating bandwidth. ISPs should be made to interconnect, much in the same way that phone companies are. That way more revenue is earned by Pakistani companies, we are likely to have hosting startup here, more jobs for IT graduates…. Interconnects mean free bandwidth for ISps. But who wants free bandwidth? More madness…..

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PTCL denies bandwidth rate cut

By Imran Ayub

KARACHI: Pakistan Telecommunication Company has denied rate cut for its international bandwidth service despite announcement in June 2006, as the privatised entity reveals in a plea it has not received any circular from an international consortium, which operates undersea fibre cable link.

Sources in telecom said local companies including Internet service providers and other telecom service operators recently approached the PTCL about non-implementation of its June 2006 orders, which had cost them more than $5 million in six months, the concerned department denied to charge reduced tariff, saying the international consortium FLAG (Fibre Link Around Globe) has not issued any notification about tariff revision.

“It is to inform you that we have no written evidence circular from our tariff department regarding the revision of tariff for IP transit FLAG VPOP connectivity,” a source quoted a letter from the PTCL’s international revenue department when it was questioned over higher tariff by one of the local operators.

“Therefore we can not bill customers on reduced tariffs without objective evidence,” added the PTCL letter.

The sources said the ISPs and other telecom service providers were making regular payments in accordance with the reduced tariff for international bandwidth but in a surprise move they started receiving arrears for the monthly advanced bills against IP transit and FLAG services.

“The ISPs and other companies later approached the PTCL but instead any positive any response the PTCL started issuing notices for payments without furnishing the reasons of accumulated arrears as against the regular release of timely payments,” said the source privy to the PTCL and ISPs negotiations.

The PTCL in June last announced to cut international bandwidth rate from $76,000 per two megabits a month to $60,000 as a first move after the Etisalat took over the management control after the company’s privatisation.

The decision attracted appreciation from the local telecom industry as the announcement also included tariff cut of FLAG services. However, now the telecom operators say they have started receiving bills with arrears that defines their previous bill payment, which were paid in line with the reduced tariff rates.

“To avoid dislocation of our services the international revenue PTCL was again approached with the request dated to provide the details or reasons of accumulated arrears,” said one of the operators, who wished not to be named.

“Finally we received a communiquÈ from the PTCL which says they have no written evidence from the FLAG to offer reduced tariff.”

He questioned the PTCL claims and said the FLAG Telecom representative had already officially communicated their agreement for the reduced same prices.

“The PTA (Pakistan Telecommunication Authority) has already showed concern over the PTCL tariff rate and the recent approach of the company would hit the industry interest, which is already bearing higher cost of doing business in Pakistan,” he added.

“In the best interest of supporting broadband services in the country the PTCL high ups and the regulator itself should intervene and issue directives to the department concerned for implementation of long pending reduced tariff effective June 2006.”

From: Ghulam Shabbir Utero
Sent: Wednesday, January 03, 2007 7:14 PM
Subject: Fiber Cuts in FLAG submarine cable near Taiwan
Importance: High

Dear Customers

This is to inform that FLAG Telecom has suffered Multiple Fiber Cuts in
their FNAL (FLAG North Asia Loop) near Taiwan due to earthquake on 26 Dec
2006.In order to carry out fiber repair, FLAG has arranged Cableship and
work is in progress.

In the meanwhile FLAG has now doubled the number of their IP backbone
circuits towards London from Hong Kong and are also putting in place
additional capacity towards the US via Taiwan and via bought-in IP Transit
services. This will hopefully improve IP services. However, you may observe
some degradation on traffic via HONG KONG but traffic via LONDON will be
normal as usual.

Hopefully, you will bear with us.

Regards

Ghulam Shabbir Utero
DE VPOP ITI Karachi

Email from PTCL NOC
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From: NOC ISB
Sent: Thursday, December 28, 2006 6:25 PM
Subject: Clarification

Dear Valued Customers
Because of the earthquake in Taiwan on 27-12-2006 (cuttings from news
sources attached) couple of our eastern side links (STIX and TeleGlobe) were
sevearly affected due to which you might have suffered degraded services
between 10am to 1pm on 27-12-2006. The problem is temporarily handeled, but
the links are not fully restored yet. The exact restoration period of these
links is not known yet and will be conveyed to you after intimation from our
upstream providers.
We highly regret the inconvenience caused to you during this period.
NOC can be contacted 24 hours and 7 days a week for Technical Assistance.

Kamran Bhatti

ADE ITI,
Network Operation Center
Pakistan Internet Exchange (PIE)
Rawalpindi, Pakistan

December 27, 2006

Earthquake Cuts Asian Telephone and Internet Services

By Randy Chen

(AXcess News) Hong Kong - A major earthquake in Indonesia disrupted telephone and Internet services in Southeast Asian countries Wednesday after an underseas cable off the coast of Taiwan was damaged by the 7.1 quake.

Chunghwa Telecom Co., Taiwan’s largest operator, managed to reroute connections, restoring partial service to the US, Canada and China. But it could still be weeks before repairs can be made to the undersea cable damaged by the earthquake.

Operators are using back-up systems to help alleviate the bottleneck as parts of Hong Kong, China, Singapore and India remain without Internet and telephone services.

Online banking services in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China remain down with HSBC completely offline.

Singapore Telecom, France Telecom SA and Pakistan Telecommunication Co. are in a group that own the Sea-Me-We3 cables linking Europe to Asia that were damaged by the quake.

Part of Asia Netcom Corp.’s EAC fiber optic cable was also damaged.

According to Internet Traffic Report, a Website that monitors the flow of global Internet traffic, the average response time in miliseconds in Asia is now 405 and packet loss has reached 30 per cent.

The earthquake struck at 8:26 p.m. local time on Dec. 26, 10 kilometers (6 miles) under the seabed, the U.S. Geological Survey said on its Web site and Internet as well as telephone services have been down ever since.

The repairs will be outsourced, using ships designed to pick up cable from the sea bed and repair it. Some repairs could take up to a month to complete.