Second SNO Announced

[gusbin]

PRETORIA, Nov 4 (Reuters) - South Africa's government said on Tuesday it would issue a licence for a second network telecoms operator and would identify investors for a 51 percent remaining stake within eight weeks.
In August, the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) told the government it should ditch both bids for the 51 percent stake in the second network operator (SNO), saying neither came up to scratch.
Utilities Transtel and Eskom [ESCJ.UL] have already been given 30 percent of the SNO with black empowerment firm Nexus holding the remaining 19 percent.
((Reporting by Jodie Ginsberg, Reuters Messaging: [email protected], tel: +27 11 775 3159, fax: +27 11 775 3132, email: [email protected]))

 

[onionpeel]

A little more information on the post above (source: Engineering News 5 November 2003)
<hr noshade size="1">
South African technology group Sentech announced yesterday that the market for broadband wireless services has arrived in South Africa.

The information, communication and technology (ICT) industry has been awaiting the technology since the company received government’s go-ahead to operate in the telecommuncations environment and provide broadband services.

The State-owned enterprise, whose core business is signal distribution for the broadcast industry, has invested close to R500-million in Internet protocol platforms that enable them to offer Internet-based, multi-messaging capabilities covering audio, video, data and text formats.

Marketing and sales GM Pragasen Nagan said that Sentech would not only be pioneering new technology, but introducing innovative pricing solutions as well.

He said because the company had no investment in legacy systems there was an opportunity to introduce new flexibility on the pricing front.

The new business will require a significant change at Sentech, which previously dealt with less than 100 customers, mainly radio and television.

Sentech claims to have developed multimedia offerings to pursue wireless business opportunities direct to home from consumers, to business, government and other organisations in South Africa.

Nagan points out: “We’re inventing an entirely new market. We have no precedents locally to go on. Every single aspect of operations has had to be researched.

Sentech’s multimedia products and services will be formally launched before the end of this year.

“Our approach to billings respects this demand. Our model is without precedent in the ICT industry, but we believe it will come as a great relief to our market”.

 

[alex]

Bloody hell they all cuttpoy and dont care about enything , well i sepose if i was there and baggin all that money i wouldnt care ithere

 

[Cloud]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">"but we believe it will come as a great relief to our market"<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

go Sentech GO!!

 

[Cerberus]

Apparently one of my co-workers heard on the radio that they will be announcing the SNO today some time? I thought it would take 8 weeks and I'm still skeptic but hey if it happens today WHOOHOO! more compotition, more choices and better prices GARANTEED!

Regards
Cerberus

 

[Chubs]

I hope Eskom plans to use that internet through power lines like Tshwane, man that would surely take the market by storm and absolutely kill telkoms internet.

 

[dace]

read in the newspaper this morning,
Transtel and Esi-Tel and Nexus majob are the SNO
and they will be starting in Feb...

goody

 

[keng]

Sorry but that is not correct
SNO must <u>still </u>be decided
http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=277959
Transtel etc are government the 51% control is still up for grabs.

Don't hold your breath for cheaper prices.

Karl Socikwa, the chief executive of Transtel, stated

As for being cheaper than Telkom, he said the strategy was "not one of getting into a price war. We will study the environment and see what's [viable] ... We will look at how best to package products competitively."
.

 

[Cerberus]

Even if the SNO arn't going to get into a price war with Telkom atleast it is yet another option to get connected to tell the truth I think the major sore point here is the bad service and weak answers we get to queries and problems as well as feeling like our voices landing on def ears. If anything atleast we will see an improvement on service if either party want clientel.

Regards
Cerberus

 

[microfast]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by keng</i>
<font color="blue"><font size="2"><i>Don't hold your breath for cheaper prices.</i></font id="size2"></font id="blue"> <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Spot on keng,

and what's more it will probably take them a year from now to
come up with prices == Telkom.


This is all political football:

"<i>I've chosen a captain but I will only inform you who this
will be once the game is over.</i>"

 

[invisible war]

i sent sentech's marketing person an e-mail about the rumours about "wireless dsl" and got the following reply:

"The Broadband Wireless product set is currently being defined. The expected launch for this product is end November 2003. The product set will contain various options based on the send and receive bandwidth and other parameters and will be offered as both a residential and business offering. It will serve as a wireless local loop thus providing Internet directly to the home/ business user. This means that the end user will not require any Telkom infrastructure to provide Internet connectivity to their desired premises. The product will be rolled out in selective metropolis initially but the coverage of other areas will follow (dependant on density, financial viability and market demand).

Unfortunately this is all that I am able to share right now, but please feel free to email Winston Smith (Portfolio Manager - [email protected]) and or watch for updates on our website for more information closer to the launch of the product.

Kind regards,
Tracy Murie."

so it does indeed look like there might be some light at the end of the tunnel, plus apparently the service will be sub R850 per month, and will definately have no cap and will run at 512k!!!

 

[ASF]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">As for being cheaper than Telkom, he said the strategy was "not one of getting into a price war. We will study the environment and see what's [viable] ... We will look at how best to package products competitively."<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

They will obviuosly look to maximise revenue -&gt; nothing wrong with that BUT now free market principles will be brought to bear on them AND Telkom which inevitably MUST result in a reduction of costs.

The only thing that worries me -&gt; and this is not conspiracy theory paranoia -&gt; is if they collude with Telkom in terms of price fixing as what happened with Vodacom and MTN a few years back. Then we are just back to square one -&gt; in fact even worse because there will be less transparency do to the nature of market price manipulation...