Following the recent announcement made by the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA), Telkom agreed to decrease IP interconnect rates by 30%. Large scale Internet Service Providers MTN and MWEB were quick to react.

Says Edwin Thompson, general manager of Technology and Infrastructure at MTN Business; “As IP Connect is one of the most expensive parts to providing an ADSL service currently, a price reduction here is long overdue. Although we are not sure what all the providers will do with the price cut, a clear benefit for the end user will likely be felt, as this will allow for various Internet providers to either improve the current broadband services offered or, should they choose, pass on the reduction in prices.”

Considering the high cost associated with the fixed-line broadband network in South Africa, many Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are currently offering broadband services that are unfortunately restricted. MTN Business believes that through this cut, the market will likely see many providers use this cut as a mechanism to improve broadband solutions offered and therefore the consumer will most likely receive an improved experience from their broadband solutions, perhaps even cheaper rates.

“We welcome this positive percentage cut as it is certainly one that is needed in the market, and will go a long way in achieving more capacity, more accessibility and more cost effectiveness – essentially improving overall broadband solution offerings for the local consumer,” concludes Thompson.

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MTN Group (MTN) has alerted shareholders to the possibility of a claim being filed by the Turkish mobile phone operator, Turkcell Iletisim AS (Turkcell), in the US federal courts.

While the claim has not been served to MTN, MTN understands that a claim has now been filed by Turkcell in the US courts against MTN and its wholly owned subsidiary, MTN International (Mauritius), in which Turkcell claims no less than $4.2 billion, plus interest and punitive, consequential and other damages, in connection with the award of the second GSM licence in Iran to Irancell.

MTN continues to believe there is no legal merit to Turkcell’s claim and no basis for such a claim to be brought before a US court. MTN will accordingly oppose the claim. MTN further notes the South African government’s denial of the allegations that MTN exercised influence over it.

In advance of Turkcell filing its claim, MTN announced the formation of an independent committee, under the chairmanship of the internationally renowned jurist, Lord Hoffmann, to investigate Turkcell’s factual allegations. The Hoffmann committee has already begun its investigations and will report its findings to the MTN board, together with any recommendations as to actions to be taken as a result of its findings, including as to their publication.

The Hoffmann committee has invited Turkcell to participate in its investigation, but Turkcell has, to date, not done so. The invitation remains open to Turkcell to participate in the Hoffmann committee’s investigation.

(Image: BusinessTech)

Following on the success of MTN’s uncapped Internet promotion, which began in October last year, MTN will permanently increase its maximum speed limits.

As from 1 February 2012, users of Uncapped Lite packages will be able to download more, moving from the current (very slow) limit of 128kbps to a slightly faster 256kbps after the 3GB limit is reached. Uncapped Pro package users will also will also get a slight increase, with a maximum speed limit lift from 128kbps to 384kbps after the 10GB limit is reached. MTN Uncapped Lite is currently R289 pm for 24 months, and Uncapped Pro is R899 per month for 24 months.

The current promotion, began on 1 October 2011, and will run until 31 January 2012. It was a response to customer demands for faster and reliable Internet access at an affordable fixed monthly cost. And with a truly uncapped, no restriction limit.

“It was impressive to see the consumption rate – which certainly speaks to the value customers are getting from this R289 p/m promotional package,” said Serame Taukobong, Chief Marketing Officer at MTN South Africa. “The term ‘uncapped’ data has been bandied around in the industry – but this is truly the most competitive unlimited promotion on offer today.”

This promotion’s success has been the impetus for MTN’s decision to revise the Fair Use policy, permanently increasing its maximum speed limits after the limits have been reached.

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The iPhone 4S has finally been launched in SA this past weekend – but the networks kept their cards close to their chest in terms of deals. Pricing was only officially announced on Thursday, and not through very public channels. Pricing is definitely better than expected, but it is clear that networks are trying to limit the choices of contracts you can receive a free phone with.

For example, last year you could get a free iPhone 4 with a Vodacom Top Up 275 contract, with 100meg of data at R379. This year, Top Up customers are not as lucky – I was quoted R3000+ pay in on the Top 315 contract. So if you want a iPhone 4S, you are pretty much forced to go for the more business orientated contracts. (more…)

This just in. MTN is about to rollout their new high speed LTE network. This is great news in SA’s current very competitive broadband space – but LTE is a newer wireless internet standard which has not been rolled out at this scale in SA yet.

However the final speeds are still a big improvement over existing wireless broadband solutions, but the biggest improvement is in latency, with around 20ms times. Compare this to current high speed HSPA+ connections, which typically do not get faster than 60ms. This will of course be beneficial for people who like their online gaming, but also for things like VoIP.

These new fibre backed network clusters only have around 600 meters coverage per antenna, which means that a significant effort is required to roll out this service, and it will not be available everywhere at first (in other words, typically city areas).

But here is the full scoop:

Today MTN announced the launch of a Long Term Evolution (LTE) pilot in five clusters around Gauteng that will revolutionise the provisioning of broadband services in South Africa.

The LTE rollout and pilot test, which MTN is undertaking in partnership with Huawei and Ericsson, will see selected MTN customers with provisioned dongles reaping the benefits of navigating on an ultra-high speed network that boasts speeds of up to 70Mbps across over 100 sites (more…)

Microsoft’s back in the mobile market with a bang. The company today launched its much-anticipated Windows Phone 7 mobile operating system in South Africa, hailing it as a “fresh start for the smartphone” and promising a new user experience that will shake up the marketplace.

The new phone is critical to Microsoft’s efforts to make new gains in the huge smartphone market, which despite the success of the iPhone and Android, is still relatively untapped globally. It also represents a new approach towards integrating products and services from across the company into the phone to create a richer experience and greater productivity, says Nazeer Suliman, the consumer and online lead for Microsoft South Africa.

“The goal for Windows Phone 7 is an ambitious one: to deliver a phone that integrates the things people really want to do and puts those things right in front of them,” said Suliman.

“Windows Phone 7 breaks the current smartphone convention to help people quickly and easily find and consume data, information and services from the Web and applications. People want one device they can access their work e-mail on and then put in their bag and go to the party, and they want it to be easy to use. That’s exactly what we’re delivering.”

The phones are expected to be available to the general public by early December on most of the major mobile networks. Initially two HTC models will be available – the HTC 7 Mozart and the HTC 7 Trophy (which will be exclusive to Vodacom) – and they will be joined by models from Samsung and LG early in the new year.

“We see Windows Phone 7 as an entirely fresh mobile experience. The range of phones reflect HTC’s strength in design and innovation, and will offer tremendous value for local mobile customers,” said Quinton Leigh, managing director of Leaf, HTC’s representative in sub-Saharan Africa.

Mapula Bodibe, MTN’s general manager for consumer marketing, said the Windows 7 Phone was a welcome addition to the operator’s smartphone line-up.

“A significant number of South African consumers are tech-savvy and early adopters of technology, with the support of our world-class internet network, this phone is certain to make a few waves in a marketplace that has been dominated by several other players,” said Bodibe.

The Windows 7 phone helps users get more done in fewer steps, thanks to a unique ‘hub and tile’ interface. The tiles offer people quick and easy access to their most valuable information as well as real-time updates from the web such as news, appointments or friends’ status. Users can also create their own tiles from whatever content they choose, such as web sites, photos and music.

The phone features ‘hubs’ for categories such as people, music and video, photos and Office. These hubs are never more than a few screens away, no matter how deep the user navigates within the phone.

The people hub, for example, pulls in Facebook status updates from friends as well as providing the more obvious contact information and phone numbers. Users can take actions like responding to updates or sending a text message right from the people hub, rather than having to find and launch a particular app.

“We think people want to get updates from their social networks, they want to get contact information, they want to get e-mails from a variety of different places, they want to share music — but they want control over it,” says Suliman.

As people use their phones, they’ll discover lots of thoughtfully designed features and perks. Holding down the camera shutter button, for example, lets the user take a picture even if the phone is locked – as Suliman says, “unlocking your phone can sometimes mean the difference between missing the moment or not.”

The phones also come with a mobile version of Internet Explorer and include support for editing Microsoft Office documents. They also have strong social media integration, with Facebook photos, music and contacts are pulled into the phone and distributed appropriately.

Look out for a review of Windows Phone 7 right here on Bandwidth Blog.

Despite 8ta‘s low call costs and reasonable data rates, the thing most people seem to most impressed by is the innovative free call and sms deals. These include:

Well it turns out the first one million customers on 8ta will be getting this for life. How cool is that?

I have already got an 8ta SIM card, and I havent been particularly impressed by how long 8ta has taken to activate the SIM card. I bought it on Monday at 16:00, RICA’d it as well. It was only fully activated on Wednesday at 3PM. They apparently had a backlog of activations.

I am trying it out on a Nokia N8, and so far the signal and data connection speed is very brisk. It locks on mostly to MTN’s network. I will be posting my impressions with 8ta in future as well. Call quality seems fine, but I havent really moved around yet.

The thing that pulled me towards 8ta was the landline calling rates – at 65c per minute all day it is the ideal solution if you do not want to pay for a landline just to make the occasional phone call.

I am however very disappointed that other network operators havent stepped up to the plate. Vodacom dropped their allday calling rate to R1.40 for prepaid, but nothing else really. Maybe they will improve their rates once 8ta announces their contract pricing?

Will keep you posted.

Last night Telkom released the initial pricing for their 8ta mobile network, and boy does it look good. 8ta has a number of small incentives in their prepaid package which immediately makes them the cheapest mobile network in SA.

But first off pricing:

Calls to landlines (this includes Telkom and Neotel) will be 65c per minute, at all times during the day. Calls to another cellphone is R1.50 per minute (this can be to Vodacom, MTN, Cell C or 8ta), again at a flat rate all day. International rate – 8ta will charge R2.50 per minute to more than a 100 countries (isnt that much less than Telkom’s fixed line rates?). What is perhaps more significant is the call incentive that 8ta uses – for every 3 seconds of incoming calls, you get 1 sec to phone out. FINALLY – a reason to keep that telemarketer on the line!

SMSs and MMSs will both be charged at 50c each – but if a customer sends 5 sms’s in a day, they will get 50 free sms’s in a day. Wonder if a person even needs a prepaid SMS bundle with something like that?

Data costs going to be R1 per meg if a user does not use a bundle, which is already half of what Vodacom charges, but their data bundle pricing also seems to improve on existing offerings:

1GB for R250, 500MB for R150, 250MB for R100, 100MB for R50. Great. These can be accessed at 7.2 HSPA, but 8ta might also upgrade to LTE in future.

All these pricing details are just for the prepaid users, so we will have to see how their contract pricing will improve on these even further. (Update: 8ta has now announced their contract pricing) Initially 8ta will use their own network as well as use a roaming agreement using MTN basestations, so clearly the Vodacom Telkom breakup was nasty. So reception should not be a problem.

So only time will tell how Vodacom and MTN will compete with this pricing – if the recent iPhone launch is anything to go by, Vodacom and MTN clearly have some flexibility in their prices. When MTN announced their lower end deal on the iPhone 4, Vodacom had to go and lower their initial iPhone 4 pricing as well 2 days later. Competition is a great thing.

Also, how will 8ta compete with Cell C’s latest mobile broadband offerings? We tested it, and it pretty much blows away the competition in SA.

But I am sure most people are still wondering how on earth Telkom can offer these good deals for mobile, yet their fixed line service pricing has remained overpriced and stagnant. We can only hope that they approach their fixed line business with the same new found vigour…