Vumatel overtakes Openserve as biggest FTTH operator in South Africa

J

Jamie McKane

MyBroadband Journalist
Joined
Mar 2, 2016
Messages
7,000
Reaction score
1,008
Vumatel overtakes Openserve as biggest FTTH operator in South Africa

The latest statistics for South Africa’s fibre market from Africa Analysis show that in March 2019, 1.39 million homes had access to an FTTH connection and 453,000 were connected.

Wayne D’Sa, the managing director of Cipherwave, presented a summary of these statistics at the MyBroadband Fibre Conference, hosted on 17 July 2019. D’Sa was giving a presentation on the state of the Internet Service Provider (ISP) industry in South Africa.
 
Vumatel, SADV, Octotel, DFA are all part of Remgro, that makes this group larger than Openserve fibre.
 
VUMA must pull its finger out of its arse in PTA.

I mean there is Silverlakes with the majority or the golf estate still with Copper Telkom lines? Not even Telkom seems realize that most residents probably the majority of customers there would switch because they started living a connected life. Now the WISP providers in the area are connecting these guys.

Metro Fibre started moving into Equestria where Openserve has fibre lines already.
It just surprises me how planning can rationalize an area with a lower income compared to something next door such as Silverlakes and say we should roll out there?

To me it seems like Openserves biggest problem is the flaws in its feasibility study. To make matters worse they already have a copper network that they could use to help with installation and planning. If you see an area with plenty of DSL customers why not switch them over to Fibre? You have poles and conduits already? Now a company like Vuma who started from scratch is better in certain metrics?

supersunbird said:
Not in Pretoria, just saying.

Vumatel:
View attachment 685919

OpenServe:
View attachment 685921
Click to expand...
 
Louis72 said:
VUMA must pull its finger out of its arse in PTA.

I mean there is Silverlakes with the majority or the golf estate still with Copper Telkom lines? Not even Telkom seems realize that most residents probably the majority of customers there would switch because they started living a connected life. Now the WISP providers in the area are connecting these guys.

Metro Fibre started moving into Equestria where Openserve has fibre lines already.
It just surprises me how planning can rationalize an area with a lower income compared to something next door such as Silverlakes and say we should roll out there?

To me it seems like Openserves biggest problem is the flaws in its feasibility study. To make matters worse they already have a copper network that they could use to help with installation and planning. If you see an area with plenty of DSL customers why not switch them over to Fibre? You have poles and conduits already? Now a company like Vuma who started from scratch is better in certain metrics?
Click to expand...

Yeah, openserve has a info on where the ADSL users are, so it should be easy for them to know where best to roll out fibre.
 
quovadis said:
Time for Openserve to drop the pricing again to be more competitive.
Click to expand...
The issue is it not pricing as much as rollout of infrastructure. This study shows the number of homes that fibre lines pass
 
A bit misleading headline. Vumatel puts their little box whether you want their fibre or not. Both their and Operserve's metrics are flawed but overall Openserve has a bigger footprint and with more fibre customers.

It does indicate something though. The next biggest competitor namely Vumatel is also the most uncompetitve.
 
supersunbird said:
Yeah, openserve has a info on where the ADSL users are, so it should be easy for them to know where best to roll out fibre.
Click to expand...
Problem is that that ADSL customers already pay Telkom every month. Cutting those customers over to fibre cannibalises the ADSL revenue, while costing capital expenditure for the fibre network. Telkom would only have an incentive to deploy fibre if another company threatens their current revenue stream.
 
deesef said:
Problem is that that ADSL customers already pay Telkom every month. Cutting those customers over to fibre cannibalises the ADSL revenue, while costing capital expenditure for the fibre network. Telkom would only have an incentive to deploy fibre if another company threatens their current revenue stream.
Click to expand...
yeah, it's easier for telkom to just tell the dumb user that there is fibre in your area (even though it's not openserve, but vuma for example) and switch them over from copper, charge an arm and a leg, and the customer is none the wiser, and telkom don't spend a cent, and let copper die.
 
Not surprised that Telkom is being hammered. Their Openserve division have technical people who are lazy and cannt even do the basics. when they installed fibre in 1 suburb it took them a year to complete the project. The contractor was an ex Telkom employee with no experience in providing fibre. Techs had to be recruited from outside to help with the installation, as the local guys could do it.
 
Surprised Openserve haven't targeted the Adsl landscape, in terms of laying Fibre. They have all the data available to them, In terms of which homes within a specific area has adsl..the cost that they pay, so then just go in and replace that with Fibre.
 
Icemanbrfc said:
Surprised Openserve haven't targeted the Adsl landscape, in terms of laying Fibre. They have all the data available to them, In terms of which homes within a specific area has adsl..the cost that they pay, so then just go in and replace that with Fibre.
Click to expand...
why? they coining it already.
 
Icemanbrfc said:
Surprised Openserve haven't targeted the Adsl landscape, in terms of laying Fibre. They have all the data available to them, In terms of which homes within a specific area has adsl..the cost that they pay, so then just go in and replace that with Fibre.
Click to expand...

Huh? They most certainly have.
 
Well, so far so good. Vumatel installed fibre in my area, I connected up on 16 July via my current ISP that I had Wisp with and I cannot complain thus far, it's been a joy ride on a 100/10mbs package. A 100GB PS4 gaming file use to take about 18-20 hours at 20mbs, depending on downloading servers, currently it takes a mere 3-4 hours at the most lol.
 
How come Telkom failed to be a noteworthy player in the FTTH space?

One would think with that amount of fiber in the ground they would have 60%+ market share.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top
Sign up to the MyBroadband newsletter
X