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Alcatel-Lucent announced that MTS-Ukraine, one of the leading mobile operators in Ukraine and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Mobile TeleSystems OJSC, has selected Alcatel-Lucent to conduct a Long Term Evolution (LTE) trial, which will begin in the second half of 2010.
“We embrace innovation that to us is a recipe for success,” said Andrei Dubovskov, Head of MTS-Ukraine. “LTE is a logical next step in the development of high-speed data transmission services. The launch of the trial LTE solution will enable us to assess the benefits of 4G technology not just in theory but through real practical experience.”
Alcatel-Lucent will be leveraging its industry-leading LTE expertise to provide an end-to-end solution including LTE base stations (eNodeBs), the Evolved Packet Core (EPC), IP service routing network elements as well as operation, administration and maintenance (OAM) systems. Alcatel-Lucent will provide a range of professional services including project management, planning, installation, integration and commissioning, and testing.
“This agreement allows us to extend our long-standing partnership with MTS, enabling Alcatel-Lucent to play a prominent role in the company’s network transformation and LTE projects. We consider this agreement to be a strong endorsement of Alcatel-Lucent’s innovation and forward-looking strategy in the area of mobile broadband solutions and efficient high-performance IP-based networks,” commented Alexander Tikhonov, Alcatel-Lucent’s vice president for the CIS.
Alcatel-Lucent’s LTE solution is leveraged in the majority of LTE projects being pursued by tier 1 operators around the globe, including in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. • 17-2-10
MTS-Ukraine’s network covers approximately 97% of the territory and 99% of the population in Ukraine. The Company provides services to more than 17.56 million subscribers. MTS-Ukraine is licensed to provide mobile services using the GSM-900/1800 and CDMA-450 standards, as well as fixed-line services.
Services to financial, telecommunications, utilities and retail industries
Utiba Pte. Ltd., a leading global supplier of mobile financial transaction platforms for mobile operators and financial institutions, is pleased to announce that the Company has entered into a joint-venture with Alternet Systems, Inc. a leader in hosted application services in the Americas.The joint-venture, Utiba Americas, will deploy a Software as a Service (SaaS) platform in the Americas and the Caribbean region focused on mCommerce and mobile financial services.
In the joint-venture, Utiba contributes its proprietary software, operational and commercial expertise, and experience in managing successful and speedy implementations of mobile financial and payment services while Alternet provides local management, technical and marketing resources, regional presence in over 16 countries, and extensive experience providing hosted applications.
Utiba Americas has a Miami based management, sales and consulting team to facilitate rapid deployment of services throughout the Americas and Caribbean region, and offers the same quality of support, both technical and business, that has made Utiba a global leader in mobile transactions.
Alternet CEO Henryk Dabrowski expressed enthusiasm for the partnership, stating, “Alternet is thrilled to partner with Utiba in the Americas. With the Utiba platform supporting approximately 60% of global mobile payments, and over 320 million subscribers, Utiba is clearly a proven leader in this exciting new field.
Together, as Utiba Americas, we will offer a suite of mCommerce and mobile financial services in the region, on a hosted application platform. We are excited about the many services that the Utiba Americas platform will enable, from mobile banking and bill payment, to mobile wallets and microloan repayment, to name only a few of the many possibilities.”
Commenting on this development, Justin Ho, Co- CEO of Utiba stated, “Collaboration with Alternet opens a new wave of impressive possibilities for both companies. The agreement with Alternet is an important step towards strengthening our presence in Americas and Caribbean region. We chose Alternet for its excellent presence in this region, product portfolio and expertise that will complement our vision of empowering everyone to make mobile payments”. • 16-2-10
Utiba was founded in 2001 with the objective of creating scalable electronic top-up and versatile mobile commerce ecosystems, where users should be able to remit amounts to anyone anywhere in the world, knowing only their mobile phone number. Utiba products are focused around providing mobile transaction and payment solutions to banks, mobile operators, micro finance institutions, and payment service providers. Utiba’s products are successfully deployed across 4 different continents and 200 million subscribers.
The Qtel Group announced plans to make Mobile Money services available for customers across its international operations at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona today.
With its regional footprint covering 17 countries, and more than 53 million customers, The Qtel Group is confident that it will generate strong demand for these services. In particular, with millions of dollars remitted from the Gulf region to Asian countries every year by expatriate workers, executives are confident that Mobile Money will have important social as well as financial benefits.
Among the services being developed as part of The Qtel Group’s mobile money proposition are secure international mobile remittance, mobile payment and mobile recharge facilities.
Because of its unique footprint, The Qtel Group believes it can become a prime provider of these services, both to existing customers within its network and to people within the scope of its remittance corridor coverage.
Dr. Nasser Marafih, Chief Executive Officer, The Qtel Group, explains: “There is a significant community of under-banked and un-banked segments in the Middle East, North Africa and Asia, and Mobile Money services will play an increasingly important role in addressing their needs. With our presence across this region, and strong connectivity with key remittance markets such as India, Indonesia and the Philippines, we are confident that The Qtel Group can play a key role in delivering Mobile Money services in a compelling and cost-effective manner.”
Research from leading group Gartner suggests that more than three billion of the world’s adult population will be able to transact electronically via mobile or other Internet-based technology by 2014. At the same time, advances in mobile payment, commerce and banking are making it easier to electronically transact via mobile phone.
Money transfer is already of critical importance in Asia, the Middle East and Asia. For expatriate workers, remittances provide a vital link to ensure the stability of families back home, and many economies benefit significantly from the process.
India, for example, is one of the world's biggest recipients of remittances, alongside China, with the total value of remittances reaching about US$50 billion by 2008. The total value of remittances to the Philippines was a record-setting US$16.4 billion in the same year.
With a network of operations in key Gulf markets, North Africa, Southeast Asia and the Asian subcontinent, The Qtel Group is confident that it can leverage both scale and synergies to deliver an attractive and cost-effective service, and add a range of more sophisticated services as the facility evolves.
Dr. Nasser concludes: “The Qtel Group has developed a strong understanding of the needs of our diverse customer base, and our research demonstrates that Mobile Money services are among the most eagerly-anticipated across multiple markets. Our aim is to be among the leading companies in this field within the next few years, supplying the most reliable and cost-effective range of Mobile Money payments to millions of our customers.” • 15-2-10
With firm roots as the leading communications provider in Qatar, The Qtel Group is a fast growing, global, integrated communications group with three business lines - consumer wireless, consumer broadband and corporate managed services. The Group is committed to expansion in line with its strategic vision to be among the world’s top 20 telecommunications companies by 2020. Over the past four years, The Qtel Group has built a successful track record of acquisitions hence expanding its geographic footprint from 1 to 17 countries within the Middle East, North Africa, Asian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia, connecting more than 53 million customers.
Now targeting its growth into the 50 million unbanked consumers with mobile phones • Unique approach to mobile financial services secures MCB 70,000 mobile customers and in excess of half a million mobile transactions in less than eight months
MCB, one of Pakistan’s leading banks, has passed an important milestone. In less than eight months the bank’s MCB Mobile service has processed more than US$10 million worth of transactions. The unique ‘shared platform’ approach in Pakistan, implemented by Access Group with Fundamo technology and expertise, means that all banks and mobile operators are able to use the same technology to deliver mobile financial services to end users. The use of a single, flexible technology platform frees banks and operators to focus on developing services that appeal to consumer needs, rather than implementing proprietary technology solutions.
70,000 MCB Mobile customers have made more than half a million transactions (such as mobile money transfers, bill payments, top ups and balance enquiries) since July 2009.
“The Pakistani regulator is one of the most proactive in the world and this shared platform would not have been possible without its support. This is a truly unique approach that stands apart from the piecemeal, proprietary implementations in other countries. It should be viewed as a blueprint by other nations looking to emulate our early success,” said Qasif Shahid, EVP, MCB Bank. “After the early success of MCB Mobile, we are now set to extend banking services to some 50 million, mobile savvy, unbanked consumers, offering them secure and convenient access to financial services.”
“Pakistan’s single platform has been a significant catalyst for mobile financial services uptake. By collaborating and embracing regulation, participants have been able to think big, start small and scale fast,” said Aletha Ling, Executive Director of Fundamo. “The result is an ecosystem that will support the long term and sustained growth of the Pakistani mobile financial services market. MCB has entered into mobile financial services with the perfect attitude – focusing on creating products and services that its customers really want.” • 17-2-10
Telecoms in emerging countries
Mobile penetration in two thirds of the African market remains below 40%, with remote regions with small enterprises and villages without effective means of communicating. The main barrier to entry is expensive satellite transmission. This remote community segment presents both a major service-delivery challenge for regional operators but also a serious revenue-generating opportunity.
By Mike Fitzgerald, CEO, Altobridge
The total wireless user figure of the African Continent, as of March 2008, stood at 280 million (1), although it was widely predicted that the 300-million subscriber mark would be reached by Q4 of the same year. Research house, Telegeography, more recently stated that 96 million new subscribers were added to Africa’s total (2) in Q1 2009, alone. While this rate of increase maintains Africa’s first place as the fastest growth market in the world, it still remains second smallest (3) in terms of cellular connections, behind the Middle East.
If the urban/sophisticated markets (some of which exhibit penetration rates of around 60%) are excluded from the statistical analysis and are viewed separately from these remote communities, which remain largely unconnected, cellular penetration figures would drop dramatically to single digits at most. With Universal Service Obligations (USO) mandating service delivery to even the most remote small populations, African mobile operators need viable ways to deliver cost-effective services.
The major obstacle has always been the high cost of transmission bandwidth, whether for terrestrial core network or satellite backhaul, and this has prevented profitable or even sustainable service delivery to these enterprise or village communities.
Some of the technologies deployed in certain parts of the world to deliver services to remote regions and meet USO requirements, have simply not enabled a sustainable business model. While initial roll-outs have been cost-effective and basic wireless services have reached a large number of isolated communities, the cost of continuing services has often come as a shock to the operator.
With very little revenue-generating traffic, the monthly overhead costs have become too high. The cost for a single BTS might appear small on paper but rises exponentially when hundreds of BTSs are involved. Therefore, the infrastructure providers have, in several cases, left the operators incurring massive operational overheads and costs —even before a call has been made— just to maintain a service for small groups of users whose ARPUs are, in any case, extremely low.
The key running cost is the expensive ‘always-on’ use of transmission bandwidth where the network backhaul resource remains open, whether core network or satellite link, even when no revenue-generating traffic is occurring. Despite the situation being addressed by the industry, widespread availability of suitable solutions remains low. However, one specialist in the field, Altobridge, has been successfully working to solve these issues for many years and has produced the patented Remote Community Solution. Altobridge’s practical experience working in remote parts of Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, has ensured an unsurpassed understanding of the business, technological, practical/logistical and cultural challenges facing mobile operators and infrastructure providers trying to deliver services to remote community users.
With leading operators already deploying the Altobridge Remote Community Solution across Asia, the company is also currently trialing its technologies with operators in Northern and Western Africa (as well as in Latin America).
What differentiates the Altobridge technology is its ability to manage and restrict the use of expensive transmission bandwidth by combining two of its patented technologies. The first is the Altobridge Split Architecture, which ensures an ‘on-demand’ use of the satellite link only when revenue-generating traffic is occurring, and uses the lowest level of bandwidth in the industry at 5-8kbps per call. This system not only cuts down transmission costs effectively, it also cuts down power consumption, which is further reduced with a ‘night mode’.
The second technology is the Altobridge Local Connectivity Platform, which enables the intelligent switching of all local calls locally. This eliminates unnecessary double satellite hops and improves network quality, which encourages longer call holding times, resulting in increased call revenues. As up to 70% (4) of calls can be local, there are significant opportunities to reduce transmission costs in all areas of the network. The Local Connectivity Platform has been licensed to world-leading infrastructure providers, including Ericsson.
The benefits of these two technologies combined in the Remote Community Solution, including a Fully Managed Service offering, makes this the most cost-effective solution for rural communities available on the market today.
According to Wireless Intelligence, the average penetration rates were 35% in West Africa and 60% in the Northern African regions at the end of 2008 (3), but combined, these two regions show around 168.5 million connections, representing around two thirds of the continent’s total connections.
Within this network activity mix, the current Altobridge trials of its Remote Community Solution will demonstrate to African mobile network operators how to profitably meet their USO requirements to provide profitable services to their remote user groups. • December 2009
Telco Updates
Telco spots on TwitterPropuestas en Brasil
Cabo Frío: paraíso a 200 km de Río • Niterói: playas, arquitectura y agenda cultural • El camino de Niemeyer: recorrido arquitectónico
Propuestas en Argentina
Ruta Nacional 40: Recorrido por la parte Norte • Centro (Cuyo) • Sur (Patagonia)
Propuestas de turismo
en la Comunidad Valenciana
Belén de Tirisiti - Patrimonio cultural en Alcoi • Los Baños del Almirante (Valencia del s.XIV) • Mundo Naval en el museo Príncipe Felipe • Arte rupestre valenciano (Museo de la Valltorta)
