Could Telkom keep Seacom pricing away from ADSL?

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Ekhaatvensters

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I was just thinking about this. Seeing as Neotel will operate the Seacom links from the landing station onto their own national network, is there anyway in which Telkom might disallow this from reaching their own national and ADSL networks?

It would basically cause the death of SAIX bandwidth if they did allow this, and we know Telkom won't want that. It's very unlikely that the consortium "board" (whoever controls SAIX pricing) will be able to compete with Seacom or do it quickly enough in any case.

I know Telkom do not even deal with the sale of bandwidth for ADSL lines directly (except for TelkomISP, which they say are "separate"), but could they force ISP's to only sell SAIX bandwidth if they want to be able to sell Telkom lines?

Just checking even though I doubt Telkom could pull something like this. But they must have some plan or else they'll be gone as soon as Neotel can supply direct Seacom bandwidth over fiber or LLU. I know Telkom would still be killing themselves by doing this as all other broadband options will have far lower bandwidth costs, but everyone still loves ADSL for now. It would definitely be technically possible so it's frightening. :p
 
With the amount of change coming, I doubt Telkom would be that stupid! If they want to force ISP's to use their bandwidth only, they're going to shoot themselves in the foot!
 
ldmelsa said:
Won't Telkom use Seacom as well?
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The only reason they wouldn't is because they own SAIX. And SAIX/SAT3 will mostly (at least completely stop growing at first) die if they use Seacom unless SAIX can afford to cut their prices by ~80% which is what Seacom claims they will be offering.

LabAnimal said:
With the amount of change coming, I doubt Telkom would be that stupid! If they want to force ISP's to use their bandwidth only, they're going to shoot themselves in the foot!
Click to expand...

Well it's either that or let SAIX's bandwidth business die as far as I can see. Also for now they have the fastest, most stable broadband technology. If Neotel was offering the prices they are now over ADSL there'd be no reason to get Telkom ADSL anymore.

In any case this is what I thought too. Just hope Telkom don't try cling to the last bit of monopoly they'll have.
 
Luckily, new ISP's have been allowed into Teklom's "loop".

So, for example, WebAfrica and Axxess could peer directly with Neotel or Dark Fibre and negotiate a better price than Teklom is offering.

However, Teklom could then increase their "ADSL LINE RENTAL" to disastrous proportions, effectively killing off Webafrica and Axxess, while at the same time, providing cheap bandwidth throughput to customers who use them as an ISP to offset the increased cost to their customers.

And there will be absolutely nothing anybody can do to stop them, because there is no monopoly situation anymore, so there is no legal and gazetted reason to prevent Teklom from charging whatever price it wants to charge.

Well, I suppose that ICASA does still have some kind of hold on the prices that Teklom is allowed to charge, but ... I'd like to see them hold that up in court.
 
yea, the changes to come are going to be an interesting set of events... cant wait ? :)
 
You'll still pay R400+ for a 4Meg DSL line and R249 for a 3GB account, except it'll now be 30GB. Telkom or Neotel or whoever won't simply roll over and die. Everyone in the industry will adjust to the new bandwidth pricing and there will be a general consensus on price. Companies are not stupid - they won't price themselves and everyone else out of the market. Neotel won't just make uncapped products cheap - it's not profitable for anyone. International bandwidth is only about 30% of the cost component of any broadband service. This is the part that will change. The other 70% cost will remain.
 
Well, Neotel has said that in past articles here that they will operate Seacom on an open access basis, and if I'm not mistaken, they indicated that Telkom will be using it as well.

AFAIK, Telkom need the cable, because of the bandwidth need for the World Cup. SAT3 just cannot cope with the amount of data that will be needed, especially since the Cup is supposed to be broadcast in HD.
 
And online streaming.

They still going to have us by the short and curlies, don't you worry. Even in the face of all this awesome change coming, IWBIWISI.

Is that being too ignorant? Probably. The consumer won't see an 80% drop in pricing, we will get taken for a massive profit ride first.
 
Gaz{M} said:
You'll still pay R400+ for a 4Meg DSL line and R249 for a 3GB account, except it'll now be 30GB. Telkom or Neotel or whoever won't simply roll over and die. Everyone in the industry will adjust to the new bandwidth pricing and there will be a general consensus on price. Companies are not stupid - they won't price themselves and everyone else out of the market. Neotel won't just make uncapped products cheap - it's not profitable for anyone. International bandwidth is only about 30% of the cost component of any broadband service. This is the part that will change. The other 70% cost will remain.
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Well for me it's more like 60%+ of the cost. I pay (R350 - 4mb) for my ADSL line and then I pay insane amounts for around 10GB of international cap. But I understand you mean for companies providing that service.

I know Telkom won't roll over and die, I was only saying the international bandwidth portion of SAIX. Can they really match Seacom on pricing for international bandwidth? It will prove they've been lying through their teeth for years if they can simply cut pricing by say 60% at least as soon as Seacom arrives. I'm not talking about the reselling companies as much as the first tier bandwidth providers
 
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Telkom have already bought space on the Seacom cable and will most likely feed that cheaper bandwidth into the ADSL arena. It would be completely ludicrous of them not to pass those savings on to the consumers. They would be shooting themselves in the foot. People will jump ship like rats on the Titanic if Telkom don't drop their prices after the middle of 2009.
 
I really thought that this cable would be a good thing for south africans the days of being ripped of were finally over, and now suddenly its the cost and runnings of everything else that is making it so darn expensive, so now that the bandwidth is super cheap it doesnt really effect pricing, how convienient :P
 
Seriously would love 10Gb for R70 (Axxess Prepaid Voucher from Engen). That would be awesome. Still expensive, but awesome.
 
i heard rumors going around of mr t planning to upgrade his 6 teabit and assumed that's seacom he's buying into.
anyhow, i don't see prices dropping dramaticly, but i do see caps raising ...i hope :)
 
Caps go bang in toy guns, caps block out sunlight - they are shadey :P, we dont want caps on our bandwidth thanks, the new fibre cable has plenty of bandwidth, so lose the caps, lose the ridiculous threshold system and let South Africans benefit from it, instead of a few company directors quadrupeling there bonus every year end :P
 
higher expectations?

i agree- there should be NO CAPS when Seacom arrives.
those who "dream" of 10GB caps etc are selling themselves short -although this is what the fat pigs at the top will most likely do-
they are saying that we should "realistically" only expect caps that r 3 times bigger than what we now have- no mention of CHEAPER & FASTER.
the 90% reduction in costs and the 10 times faster they were talikg about, will conveniently apply to ISP's- only gullible fools will accept/belive whatever the "experts/analysts? say.
here is the cell number of a guy who works for SEACOM :
i tried him once- got voicemail.
if anyone can get any useful info from him, please post it here.
 
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