{"id":336930,"date":"2005-01-28T05:15:26","date_gmt":"2005-01-28T05:15:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/336930-brighter-days-draw-nigh-for-telecoms.html"},"modified":"2005-01-28T05:15:26","modified_gmt":"2005-01-28T05:15:26","slug":"brighter-days-draw-nigh-for-telecoms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/336930-brighter-days-draw-nigh-for-telecoms.html","title":{"rendered":"BRIGHTER DAYS DRAW NIGH FOR TELECOMS"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font size=\"2\">A further development, that of an investment by India&#8217;s Tata Group into<br \/>SA&#8217;s second network operator (SNO), is adding to the general air of<br \/>excitement. The Tata deal means the long-delayed infrastructure rival to<br \/>Telkom may finally begin offering services this year. Details of the<br \/>structure of the second operator should be announced within two weeks,<br \/>according to the department of communications (see page 32). <\/p>\n<p>Of course, all of these things should have happened years ago. The FM<br \/>has been arguing since 1997 that granting Telkom a five-year exclusivity<br \/>period, which ended in 2002, was a mistake. And government bungling over<br \/>the licensing of the SNO simply made matters worse. <\/p>\n<p>In the absence of competition, Telkom hiked its rates for call charges<br \/>and for Internet lines to such an extent that it is now one of the most<br \/>expensive fixed-line operators in the world. This has discouraged<br \/>foreign investment and curtailed the adoption of broadband. SA lags<br \/>behind many developing nations &#8211; not to mention the developed world &#8211; in<br \/>broadband penetration, simply because the services are grossly<br \/>overpriced. <\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s easy therefore to understand the excitement on the eve of February<br \/>1. Alas, as with most things, change cannot happen overnight. Consumers<br \/>shouldn&#8217;t expect the SNO to begin offering them a phone service<br \/>immediately &#8211; if ever. Nor should they expect broadband prices to be<br \/>slashed in half right away. But competition will drive down prices in<br \/>the long term, making it more affordable to do business in this country.<\/p>\n<p>The Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa), which regulates<br \/>the industry, has a critical role to play in the opening up of the<br \/>market. It must create regulations that allow new entrants to compete on<br \/>an equitable basis with the incumbent operators &#8211; Telkom and the<br \/>cellphone networks. It must also stop the incumbents from abusing their<br \/>dominance. In short, it needs the resources to act in favour of the<br \/>market &#8211; and requisite support from government to enable it to do so.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SA&#8217;s telecommunications sector is buzzing with anticipation: next<br \/>\nTuesday, the market will be significantly opened to competition.<br \/>\nCompanies that previously provided only Internet access can now offer<br \/>\ntheir clients voice telephony, too. And they can also build their own<br \/>\nnetworks independent of Telkom. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-336930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336930"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336930\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}