State-owned telco BSNL on Monday said it plans to launch India’s biggest IPO to raise over US$10 billion. “The company is valued at well over US$100 billion. We are looking at offloading up to 10% stake, subject to government approval,” BSNL finance director S K Saxena told reporters. When asked about the development, telecom minister A Raja said: “The government is considering it (an IPO). The department of telecom (DoT) will discuss the issue and take a final decision soon”.
A United Nations survey of global e-government readiness has found that many Asian countries are sliding down the rankings. Just one Asian country—South Korea—made the top ten coming in at sixth, with Japan next on 11th. The next highest was Singapore at a surprisingly low 23rd, and Malaysia at 34th. The top 35 countries are otherwise dominated by Europe, Australasia and North America. The biggest revelation was that most Asian countries are sliding down the rankings.
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on Thursday (Jan 3) recommended open bidding process for granting licences for mobile television service in the country. Allocation of spectrum to mobile TV licensees should be automatic for successful bidders and should not require any further selection process. The FDI limit for mobile television service providers should be 74 per cent, it said.Releasing its recommendations on issues relating of mobile TV service here, TRAI said there were two routes for providing the services — one by using the telecom network with spectrum already allotted, and the other using the broadcasting method — and both can be used for launching the service. Telecom operators, having the Unified Access Services License (UASL) or the Cellular Mobile Telephony Service (CMTS) License, will not require any further licence or permission for offering mobile TV services on their own network using spectrum already allotted to them.
Responding to complaints from harassed consumers who are offered “broadband” at speeds much slower than those stipulated by the government, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) has taken a tough call. It has written to operators saying they can no longer advertise broadband services that say they offer “up to” 256 kbps speeds, thereby circumventing the rules by offering services at far lower speeds Instead, Trai has directed all operators to clearly mention the minimum guaranteed download speeds in various packages. The regulator said operators have promised to abide by the new direction. Meanwhile, the regulator has also mooted a discussion paper, which was released today, on whether the present level of 256 kbps defined as the minimum speed for a broadband connection should be raised to bring it on a par with international standards. The paper said in countries like France and Singapore, broadband is defined as a minimum speed of 512 kbps.
Click on the links to see the full articles covering LIRNEasia’s book, ICT Infrastructure in Emerging Asia: Policy and Regulatory Roadblocks. ‘BSNL’s monopoly over infrastructure a hindrance to growth’ – Financial Express (India) Rural connectivity is now the focus of every telecommunication player in the country. Almost all stakeholders, from handset manufacturers to service providers, believe that the next wave of growth is in the rural areas.”However, India’s roll out (of telecom services) in rural areas has been slow. BSNL has the backbone infrastructure but is not yet ready to share it with private players,” he added.
LANKA BUSINESS ONLINE – LBO A digital satellite radio disaster alert system that can be remotely activated which was field tested in Sri Lanka is now ready for use in the region to give early warning of tsunamis, officials said.The Addressable Radio for Emergency Alert (AREA) system can send disaster alerts within seconds of its transmission by government authorities and also has the advantage of activating a siren. The system is also expected to be adopted in India, which along with Sri Lanka, was among several countries that suffered from the 2004 tsunami. The system, which has early-warning emergency messages, audio and visual alarms, was tested in a study conducted by LIRNEasia, a regional policy think tank, and Sarvodaya, a charity, in 32 Sri Lankan coastal villages. Powered by ScribeFire.
The story of telecommunications reforms in India offers a fascinating example of how determined leadership can overcome even the fiercest opposition to reforms, says Arvind Panagariya The total number of phones in India as of October 31, 2007 is placed at 256 million. India has been adding phones at the rate of 6.65 million per month. Tele-density — the number of phones per 100 individuals — now stands at 22.52.
The Ink Fades on a Profession as India Modernizes – New York Times the professional letter writer is confronting the fate of middlemen everywhere: to be cut out. In India, the world’s fastest-growing market for cellphones, calling the village or sending a text message has all but supplanted the practice of dictating intimacies to someone else.And so Mr. Sawant, 61, and by his own guess the author of more than 10,000 letters of others, was sitting idly at his stall on a recent Monday, having earned just 12 cents from an afternoon spent filling out forms, submitting money orders, wrapping parcels — the postal trivialities that have survived the evaporation of his letter-writing trade. Powered by ScribeFire.
Rama was the keynote speaker at CPRsouth2. She was fascinating. A person who looks at the bottom of pyramid without a special emphasis on ICTs; relying on data, but applying real thinking to the data rather than just parrot the data. End result was that I bought her book and read it end-to-end (something I rarely do these days). She mentions in several places that the SEC D&E consumers are willing to spend more money than expected on education, health and transport.
New disaster warning technology on anvil-India-The Times of India AREA is expected to deliver the ‘disaster alert’ within seconds of its transmission from the authorised authority and also has the provision to get connected to a siren.Further, the device can be powered by small solar panels and the antennas are compact in size. In normal times, the system can be used for infotainment purposes. “The receiver automatically turns on even when it is not in use at the time of the alert,” Rangarajan added. In terms of cost, each system would be costing a few thousand rupees depending on AREA configuration — whether it is attached to a computer or a fixed location, with public address for the community, among others.
It was not long ago that Laloo Prasad Yadav Minister of Railways and former Bihar Chief Minister sarcastically asked what computers can do for his constituency, comprised mostly of agriculture communities. Had he been to Madurai with the CPRSouth participants on last Monday (Dec 17) perhaps he might have learnt. This lady, with so many others, plays an integral role in ROPE (Rural Outsourced Production Enterprise) which sets up dedicated village-based contract production centers for its clients. Its mission is to integrate domestic and international markets with informal sectors of rural India and generate value for the skills and resources available in these sectors. This lady and others like her, we were told, make INR 50 (USD 1.
The second conference of CPRsouth2: ‘Empowering rural communities through ICT policy and research’, commenced on December 15, 2007 in Chennai, India. The three-day conference is being held in association with the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras‘s (IIT-M) Rural Technology and Business Incubator (RTBI). The events also include pre- and post-conference tutorials on December 14 and 18, 2007 and the second meeting of the CPRsouth Board. More Information
The LIRNEasia HazInfo team, Rohan Samarajiva, Nuwan Waidyanatha, Natasha Udu-gama, joined its partners from Sarvodaya, Dialog Telekom and WorldSpace Corporation (India) to present findings from the “Evaluating Last Mile Hazard Information Dissemination” (HazInfo) pilot project at the “Making Communities Disaster Resilient” on December 11, 2007 during the Third Global Knowledge Partnership (GK3) conference in Kuala Lumpur from 11-13 December. The session, moderated by Prof. Rohan Samarajiva, presented findings and analysis within a 90-minute session divided into two mini-sessions on technology and community. Mr. Michael De Soyza of Dialog Telekom and Mrs.
A major telecom event in one of the most exciting markets in the world, India, is underway in New Delhi, Dec 12-14, 2007. LIRNEasia presented its teleuse@BPO research at the first session: rs_indiatelecom07_final.ppt/ The central message was that India had to take the road less traveled by, focusing on developing the mobile as an interface to the Internet and its communication, information retrieval, publishing, transacting, etc. functionalities, if it is not to leave behind the people at the Bottom of the Pyramid. A most fascinating presentation by Steve Rondel of Conversay showed that voice interface with the mobile was not as distant as some think it might be.
Among the five countries LIRNEasia has conducted its survey on teleuse at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP), which country do you think we found people who are least willing to share their mobile phone with a another? (a) India (b) Pakistan (c) Philippines (d) Sri Lanka (e) Thailand This was one of the interesting questions asked during the interactive quiz show at the LIRNEasia organized session at GK3, ‘Teleuse at the Bottom of the Pyramid’. The session addressed issues like the misconceptions about the teleuse (including Internet) at the BoP; exact nature of the demand at the BoP (in terms of using common facilities, getting connected, staying connected); strategic behaviours do users at the BoP engage in and policy and regulatory barriers stand in the way of the BoP being served. Team Blue emerged as clear winners scoring 105 marks against 35 scored by Team Red. Part 2 of the quiz show will be there today (Dec 13) from 14:00 – 15:30 hrs @ Room 302, Level 3, KLCC.
LANKA BUSINESS ONLINE – LBO Although seen as India’s greatest challenger in terms of its potential scale, China fared poorly for language skills, Gartner said. China, India and Singapore all had strong government support for the promotion of their country as an offshore services location. The political and economic environment remains a concern for many companies when moving work to offshore locations and so Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Vietnam rated poorly, Gartner said. Powered by ScribeFire.