Will SA mobile operators fall to the LTE curse?

So when is ICASA going to give network providers the spectrum they require?

Surely it must be a nightmare to refarm on existing frequencies?
 
Doesn't matter how fast your car is if the price of petrol is so expensive.
 
genetic said:
So when is ICASA going to give network providers the spectrum they require? Surely it must be a nightmare to refarm on existing frequencies?
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This is the single biggest problem. However, in this case it is not ICASA to blame, but the Department of Communications. ICASA is waiting for the DoC to say what must happen...
 
I think the difference is the cost of voice.. currently that remains the primary driver for profit in SA and LTE comes with changes to core which potentially brings down the cost of voice.. of cause this involves a lot of cost to change to an IP based network(and upgrades to older other nodes). From that perspective things remain in SA.(for now). but elsewhere where voice costs have already dropped to a low profit margin product operators either have to roll out additional services or relegate themselves to just being a really nice, typically affordable data pipe <-- which is a low profit model in a competitive market. Then again.. i dunno lol
 
They made Karin Fourie look like a Taiwanese mail order wife in that picture. Good job. 10/10
 
Mobile operators of this country are partially responsible for lusciously maintaining the financial inequality between the rich and the poor. All shareholders in this industry here are dogs.
 
What I am about to say has been said so many times, it has turned stale.
So I'm going to say it in the form of a (bad) rhyming verse:

The Share-holders stirred from their quite, restful bliss
They asked the operators: "Who will pay for all of this?
In South Korea, LTE made an ugly, red financial mark."
Replies the operator: "Fear not. Behold our savior, the OOB shark"
 
rpm said:
This is the single biggest problem. However, in this case it is not ICASA to blame, but the Department of Communications. ICASA is waiting for the DoC to say what must happen...
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I wonder if this is on purpose to try and allow telkom to catch up their outdated fixed line network to be competitive to the wireless market?

I lolled at

8ta was asked for comment about their LTE network investment, but the company did not respond by the time of publication.
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Our providers were in the same situation (and still are) with regards to 3G. Just replace LTE with "3G" and korea with SA and you have the current situation.
 
Vodacom spokesperson Richard Boorman said that it is definitely their plan to make money from LTE.
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Sure, there are millions of people too stupid to realize they are being raped every day.
 
Sure, but you could get an unlimited data package for $54 at 40Mbps less than a year ago, so I don't really think you can compare the kinds of volume they are. Remember they can get 100Mbps home links uncapped which is what the mobile needs to compete with.

A nice little infograph I found via Google.
http://xandroidtablets.com/images/Infographic_web.png

I don't see why all the mobile guys can't just make 15c/MB the standard rate OOB and then do some package deals, surely by now the networks should be up to scratch to handle decent traffic volumes? Hell can't they get some cheap Diginet links from Telkom and route data separately to voice? Imagine the bulk discounts they must be able to get.
 
Bern said:
I don't see why all the mobile guys can't just make 15c/MB the standard rate OOB and then do some package deals, surely by now the networks should be up to scratch to handle decent traffic volumes? Hell can't they get some cheap Diginet links from Telkom and route data separately to voice? Imagine the bulk discounts they must be able to get.
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No chance on Diginet - that was in the day when a standard 2mbps link supported 30x simultaneous calls - now that link can't even handle one data connection.

The operators are racing to self-provision on fibre - that's the only way they stand a chance of meeting demand. That's easy for the main connections, but there are tens of thousands of sites that must be connected across the country and many sites are only feasible with microwave.
 
The concept of 'profitability of LTE' is rather moot in itself. If one operator decides to proceed, they will gain a technical advantage which the others will eventually have to follow. Since they are all proceeding, the next milestone for customers is a coverage war.
 
entrepr said:
No chance on Diginet - that was in the day when a standard 2mbps link supported 30x simultaneous calls - now that link can't even handle one data connection.

The operators are racing to self-provision on fibre - that's the only way they stand a chance of meeting demand. That's easy for the main connections, but there are tens of thousands of sites that must be connected across the country and many sites are only feasible with microwave.
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The quality of Diginet i can't really comment on, but with the codecs the mobile guys use surely they can cram a lot more than that in to 2Mbps??? I thought the current ones they use are under 16Kbps. I was thinking diginet for the data portion of the connection, you can get a lot of diginet for the same price as a leased line.
 
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