Broadband, wireless face tough future

Johannesburg, 03 Sept 2007

Remaining competitive while government attempts to assert control over the provisioning of broadband in SA will be the country's biggest challenge for 2008, says Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx.

Goldstuck is a panellist at ITWeb's Broadband & Wireless 2007 Conference. He will be joined on the conference analyst panel by Rudolph Muller, founder of MyADSL; Brian Neilson, director of telecommunications research, BMI-Techknowledge; Dobek Pater, managing member of the Africa Analysis Team; and Corrie Froehlich, senior industry analyst for Frost & Sullivan.

"The big twin issues for broadband in 2008 will be the extent to which the government attempts to control broadband provisioning, and the extent to which it allows a more competitive environment in broadband back-end provisioning, as well as in business and consumer services," adds Goldstuck.

He says government policy seems geared to the tight regulation of broadband, even as it talks the language of encouraging competition. "As a result, it gives with one hand and takes away with the other. The big challenge is to encourage a more magnanimous government."

Muller predicts the same challenges.

Quoting president Thabo Mbeki, he says: "The lack of competition in the South African fixed-line space means high prices and low service levels. Continued government interference in the local telecoms arena means there is very slow progress when it comes to true market liberalisation."

According to Muller, breaking this trend will require drastic steps, which may include a new outlook by the Department of Communications.

Opportunity knocking

The majority of analysts agree the clouds are breaking for the future of SA's broadband and wireless industry, leaving it with opportunity for business.

"There is still more road ahead than behind in respect of subscribers, especially in the residential sector of the market," says Neilson.

Froehlich believes delivering a mobile converged product, such as voice over IP and instant messaging that is both affordable and easy to use, will also prove to be one of the industry's opportunities for 2008.

According to Goldstuck, the big opportunity lies in the current enthusiasm to roll-out infrastructure, both for international cable access and local mobile broadband capacity. "If no further barriers to this roll-out are erected by government, we will have a dramatically enhanced broadband environment, which will go a long way towards bringing down the cost of telecommunications in SA."

The analysts will elaborate on these and other topics at the Broadband & Wireless 2007 Conference to be held on 9 and 10 October at Gallagher Estate in Midrand.