Neotel gears up

By Staff Writer for Neotel
Johannesburg, 05 Nov 2007

Neotel, SA`s second national fixed-line telephony operator, will Thursday next week tell the public what it is offering - and at what price - in the way of service to bring Telkom`s de facto monopoly one step closer to an end.

Neotel spokesman Mala Suriah last month said the would-be Telkom rival will make an announcement "very soon, definitely this year".

The announcement has been delayed several times. In November last year, Neotel executive head of strategy Angus Hay said the company expected to start offering domestic voice and data services to businesses in January. This was subsequently pushed back to mid-year and then to September, before being pegged for 15 November.

It is expected that Neotel`s product launch will include consumer services. The second national operator is doing CDMA trials for consumer voice and data services. MD Ajay Pandey previously said Neotel would launch consumer services once the trial is completed.

While no capital expenditure details are available at this stage, Neotel previously said it would spend R11 billion on infrastructure over the next 10 years. At its highest, this is expected to reach R5 billion in one year.

Preparations for the roll-out of services have included deploying national infrastructure, putting call centre facilities in place and providing staff with the necessary training. Neotel has also set up offices in Durban and Cape Town.