Despite the phenomenal growth of India’s mobile sector, broadband growth has severely lagged behind. Pradip Baijal, the former Chairman of TRAI comments on some of the reasons for this sluggish growth.
We always spoken about infrastructure sharing for last mile. The most important infrastructures that can be shared is backhaul infrastructure. BSNL and other operators should be encouraged by the government and the regulator to share the backhaul infrastructure like optical fibre cable, backhaul spectrum etc. Virtual Private Networks are a way of life for medium to large enterprises all over the world and should be propagated for use in villages. Of 6.5 lakh villages in India, the majority are in the interiors. These villages need connectivity for various institutions like primary schools, panchayats, primary health…
By Eric Sylvers International Herald Tribune
Published: October 9, 2006
MILAN A battle is brewing that may well decide how Europeans connect to the Internet using cellphones, laptops and other portable devices in the coming decade.
Mobile phone companies, chip makers and manufacturers of wireless networks are pushing their sometimes conflicting cases for how the limited amount of radio frequencies should be used to beam data from the Internet to mobile devices and back the other way, a decision that generally is left to national governments.
Read the rest of the International Herald Tribune article HERE
The final report of the study that was conducted on Sri Lanka’s BPO sector is available for download below as a PDF file (931kb)
A Baseline Sector Analysis of the Business Process Outsourcing Industry of Sri Lanka
BBC Story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/5344654.stm
Does anyone here suffer from Nebrols (Network Broken Limbs Syndrome) 
According to this article that appeared today in India’s Business Standard, TRAI seems to be considering using a base price + beauty pagent mechanism to award 5 licenses (of 5MHz each) for companies to introduce 3G services.
The prduence of using beauty pagents needs to be questioned. The failures of 3G auctions in Europe in 2000 has been mentioned as one of the reasons for opting for a beauty pagent. However the failures of those auctions stemmed from operators’ over-estimating the potential of a new and untested service. It is unlikely that operators would make the same mistake again - my argument being once-bitten, twice shy.
Economists would argue that auctions, with sufficent safe guards to eliminate (or at the very least minimize) collusion/signalling and to enforce…
Sept 12: Pradip Baijal, the former chairman of the TRAI, puts forth his comments on TRAI’s experiences with competition regulation in this article on Rediff.
Read the entire article HERE
The current potential global Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) market of USD 11.5 billion is expected to grow ten-fold to around USD 120-150 billion in the near future. However, Sri Lanka only recently started emerging as a potential destination for outsourced work.
Given that the BPO industry is in its infant stages in Sri Lanka, there is a dearth of quantitative and qualitative information regarding the sector. LIRNEasia was commissioned by the Information and Communication Technology Association (ICTA) of Sri Lanka to conduct a baseline sector analysis of the BPO industry in Sri Lanka.
The study identifies factors that attract BPO-related investments into Sri Lanka and also potential constraints to such investment growth. Although not designed to be a policy document but a nuts-and-bolts study of an emerging…
Thursday, August 17, 2006 Posted: 1431 GMT (2231 HKT)
(AP) — The ambitious project to provide low-cost laptop computers to poor children around the world is about to take a small step forward.
More than 500 children in Thailand are expected to receive the machines in October and November for quality testing and debugging.
Read the rest of the article on CNN
The article raises some interesting points with regards to the potential impacts of regulatory intereventions (in this case on the issue of LLU). Subsequent to being forced to reduce its LLU fee, Telstra stock has stumbled. Can anyone with more regulatory experience on this blog share their thoughts on this article? Is this a case of over regulation?
The article can be found at HERE
A related International Herald Tribune article can be found HERE
With so many options becoming available to consumers to circumvent their mobiles and fixed phones, I wonder how much longer we can expect a single tier internet.
The linked BBC article examines some new VOIP companies which are providing last mile access (for PC/PHone to phone communication) for free.
Sri Lanka’s Department of Census and Statistics will be conducting a household computer literacy survey in October 2006. The questionnaire for the survey has been posted on their website for comments. Comments have been requested by August 14, 2006.
The document can be found HERE
The documents includes instructions on how to send comments.
June 21 (Bloomberg) — Vonage Holdings Corp. and other providers of Internet-based telephone service must help subsidize services in rural and low-income areas, U.S. regulators said.
A rule adopted today by the Federal Communications Commission requires providers of Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, service to contribute 10.5 percent of their long-distance revenue to the Universal Service Fund if the calls pass through traditional phone networks. Mobile-phone companies such as Cingular Wireless LLC may have to pay more as well.
“We take these actions because we recognize the changing telecommunications marketplace,” FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said during a meeting today. The rule is an interim measure that will help maintain the stability of the fund while the commission works to create a long-term, “technology-neutral” contribution system, Martin…
Tags: Cingular Wireless LLC, Federal Communications Commission, Internet-based telephone service, Kevin Martin, phone networks, telecommunications marketplace, United States, Universal Service Fund, voice over internet protocol, VOIP, Vonage Holdings Corp..
LIRNEasia and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), with the assitance of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada, co-sponsored the “Workshop on ICT Indicators for Benchmarking Performance in Network and Services Development” in New Delhi from 1-3 March 2006. The workshop highlighted the need for accurate, standardized and comparable indicators for the region and was intended to initate action to develop such indicators.
The workshop brought together representatives of National Regulatory Authorities (NRAs), National Statistical Organizations (NSOs) and operators from Afghanistan, Bangaldesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka along with the foremost authorities on the subject from the ITU, OECD, and the US National Regulatory Research Institute (NRRI). With nearly 60 participants from 16 countries, the Workshop was also attended by telecom researchers…
Tags: Afghanistan, Asia, Ayesha Zainudeen, Bhutan, Canada, e-indicators, Gaurav Singh, India, International Development Research Centre, ITU, Lilia Perez-Chavolla, Maldives, Nepal, New Delhi, OECD, Pakistan, Pradip Baijal, Rajendra Singh, Rohan Samarajiva, Sam Paltridge, Sri Lanka, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Tim Kelly, US National Regulatory Research Institute.
This preliminary study to compare mobile tariffs in the Asian region, has been undertaken in keeping with the proposed 2006 theme of the World Dialogue on Regulation for Network Economies (WDR), ‘Sector and Regulatory Performance Indicators.’ The definition of standardized benchmark indicators with their respective viable methodologies in the Asian context is required for an accurate comparative analysis of the regulatory and sector performance in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs)
The preliminary study has produced surprising findings with regards to the relative costs between prepaid and postpaid mobile tariff packages. It is hoped that the release of the preliminary results will engage disucssion with stakeholders, especially operators in the formulation of an accurate and standardized methodology to reflect the holistic costs associated with the use of…
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