Life:) dealers offers access to customer support service (Ukraine)
Ukrainian mobile operator, life:) has launched a service that enables its official dealers to address most of its customers’ questions regarding their mobile accounts.
Official dealers of life:) can access financial information on services that customers used, including incoming and outgoing calls, SMS value added services, internet services and other content services.
To access the information, the dealer’s representative needs to send an SMS inquiry to the number of the customers to get the confirmation of the access possibility. The dealer’s representative will be able to access the information on the subscriber’s account once it obtains a confirmation code from the subscriber.
Internet services affected by Japan quake (Malaysia)
Internet services in Malaysia have been affected by the massive earthquake in Japan, according to reports, citing the top executive at fixed-line and broadband internet operator Telekom Malaysia Bhd.
According to Chief Executive Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa, the company will do its utmost to improve Internet services after the Japan-US Cable Network, or JUCN, and the Asia Pacific Cable Network 2, or APCN2, were both affected by last Friday’s 8.9-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Japan.
APCN2 is a submarine telecommunications cable linking several countries in the Asia-Pacific region, while the JUCN links the US and Japan.
As per Zamzamzairani, the JUCN cable network is still down, while Telekom Malaysia was able to move some traffic on ACPN2 to another restoration path, but that has caused slow browsing during peak hours. They will try their best to divert traffic to other routes to reduce and restore the customer experience.
EarthLink completes acquisition of STS Telecom
EarthLink, Inc., a leading IP infrastructure and services company, today announced that it has completed the acquisition of STS Telecom, a privately-held business providing voice, data and internet services to small to medium-sized business customers in Florida and Georgia.
For 2011 EarthLink expects STS Telecom to contribute approximately $15 to $18 million to EarthLink revenues and for the transaction to be accretive on a free cash flow basis. EarthLink will integrate STS Telecom into its newly established “EarthLink Business” division.
“We are very impressed with the experience level and processes STS Telecom built to sell and support a hosted VoIP platform,” stated Rolla P. Huff, EarthLink’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “We will leverage this platform and the talented people at STS to launch a nationwide hosted VoIP product for EarthLink Business over our ubiquitous IP network. In addition, STS Telecom’s customer base overlaps with our fiber network in South Florida so this acquisition is an opportunity to layer a growing and profitable revenue stream onto the EarthLink Business southeast fiber network.”
Mark Amarant, Chief Executive Officer of STS Telecom, added, “STS has successfully provided a Hosted PBX solution to small and medium-sized businesses on our proprietary platform since 2005. I am pleased that EarthLink will be able to scale our capability of offering a complete hosted voice and data solution to businesses with solid average revenue per customer (ARPU) to a national level. The completion of this transaction is an extremely positive next step for our company, our employees and our customers.”
Millions suffered due to Finnish mobile network fault (Finland)
Finland’s mobile network operators suffered a system failure on Saturday morning that left about a million subscribers without any service. The problem, which affected users in the northern two-thirds of the country, was resolved only by the middle of the afternoon.
The mobile network, Elisa stated that the failure started at 7:00 in the morning in Tampere, with an electric fault at one of the company’s control rooms. The fault only affected mobile services, leaving the landline and internet services unaffected.
Although emergency calls from mobiles should automatically lock onto the strongest signal, regardless of the provider, there were anecdotal reports of some people having difficulty making such calls because of drop-off of calls at emergency centers.
An even more extensive failure in the Elisa network occurred in 2007, when an estimated two million mobile phones were affected.
Viettel wins Peru fixed wireless license
The Vietnamese company Viettel Group is all set to provide fixed mobile services in Peru through an award in which it undertook to provide free Internet services to more than four thousand schools.
The official announcement of the award shows that the company will operate the 1,900 MHz C-band and will compete with existing companies, Claro, Movistar and Nextel.
The Vietnamese company agreed to pay US$27 million for use of the band and will invest US$150 million to develop the necessary infrastructure for their services.
According to the Deputy General Director of Viettel Global, Quang Nguyen, the company will start services by the end of the year.
Nigeria shows first internet exchange point
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has reportedly commissioned the country’s first internet exchange point, aimed at reducing the cost of internet services nationwide.
According to Executive vice chairman of the NCC, Eugene Juwah, the Lagos-based Internet Exchange Point of Nigeria (IXPN) would save the country US$20 million in offshore internet bandwidth payments in the first year alone, by keeping domestic internet traffic within Nigeria.
According to Chima Onyekwere, Chairman of the IXPN board, at IXPN, they are committed not only to the development of a national internet infrastructure, but increasingly an infrastructure that will span the entire African continent, Europe, America, Asia and the entire world. Plans are reportedly underway to commission further exchange points in the country’s six geopolitical zones.
Zamtel to invest $23m in Internet services (Zambia)
Zambia’s largest fixed-line Phone Company, Zambia Telecommunications Co., or Zamtel, is planning to invest at least $23 million in its network across the country in a bid to improve Internet services.
According to company’s CEO Kennedy Mambwe, the project is a rollout plan that is aimed at ensuring all districts in the country attain improved Internet services by the end of February.
Last year, Libya’s LAP Green Networks bought a 75% stake in the former state-owned company for $257 million, beating out bids from groups led by Angola’s Unitel Corp. and Russia’s VimpelCom Ltd. (VIP). The government retained a 25% stake in the company.
Online companies should pay according to traffic they generate: France Telecom
France Telecom has stated that Google and others should be billed according to how much traffic they generate on French networks.
According to the Director General of France Telecom Stephane Richard, using the network of a provider in France should be subject to a charge. Those who generate a lot of traffic should contribute according to the traffic they generate.
Addressing a conference at the Icate telecom and audiovisual institute in Montpellier, southern France, he stated that Internet firms generating lots of online activity should share the cost of updating networks to meet the demand. France Telecom was making big investments to expand Internet services which should be accompanied by a fair sharing of value between content providers and operators.
Israel’s Partner Communications Profits Up by 17.5%
Israel’s Partner Communications – which trades as Orange has revealed its Q3 results. As per the results the company’s quarter revenues rose by 4.8% to US$450 million, while net profits increased by 17.5% to US$84 million. EBITDA also up by 12.5% toUS$175 million.
Revenues from data and content services excluding SMS increased 11.1% to US$44 million 11.1% of service revenues, increasing by 25% compared with 9.2% of service revenues in Q3 2009.
In the quarter the company added 37,000 net new cellular subscribers. At quarter-end, the cellular subscriber base was approximately 3,133,000. At quarter-end, there were approximately 1.49 million 3G subscribers. Total market share is estimated to be approximately 32%, no change from the previous quarter.
According to Partner’s CEO, Mr. Yacov Gelbard, Partner continues to achieve excellent financial results. However, the company is not taking its achievements for granted and that is why they took two significant steps this quarter to ensure that the profitability continues to grow in the coming years: first, by signing an agreement with Ericsson for the upgrade of network, and second, by entering into an agreement for the purchase of 012 Smile, a leading Israeli operator of international telecommunication services, internet services and local fixed line telecommunication services. In their core cellular business, the company is currently formulating a strategic plan to mitigate the impact of the reduction of interconnect tariffs. The measures Partner may take include, among others: cost cutting, operational efficiency improvements and repackaging of product offerings.
America Movil to combine fixed, mobile operations under Claro brand (Argentina)
Mexican telecoms operator America Movil will join its fixed and mobile operations in Argentina under the Claro moniker from 20 October 2010.
According to reports, the move will make Claro the first operator in the country to offer telephone and internet services under a single brand, on the same bill and using its own infrastructure.
America Movil began the incorporation of its fixed line subsidiary Telmex Argentina with its local mobile unit Claro in August, after America Movil took control of Telmex’s parent Telmex International the previous month.
In the coming months, the sale of products and services will be combined in retail outlets and customer service centres, with a diverse focus on the mobile market.
According to the company, it also plans to obtain a license to provide pay TV services, which the operator will require investment in Telmex’s fibre network to reach customers’ homes directly.
