Telkom is to provide worldwide mobile satellite telephone system GlobalStar with an earth station in Delareyville.
The earth station will be owned and operated by Telkom on behalf of GlobalStar, in line with the GMPS policy recently published by the Government. GlobalStar is a low earth orbit (LEO) satellite-based digital telecommunications system that will offer wireless telephone and other telecommunications services worldwide as from the beginning of 1999. The system currently comprises 48 LEO satellites.
Ben Higson, project director: GlobalStar Southern Africa, says: "This earth station will be the hub for GlobalStar`s system in Southern Africa. It will extend the cover of GSM cellular networks throughout the region."
Telkom will complete construction work on the earth station, which will house four satellite dishes, by the second quarter of next year. Testing will then commence and Higson expects the station to go live in the third quarter of 1999. The station at Delareyville is one of about 75 GlobalStar LEO earth satellite sites around the world.
Speaking at the public launch of the project in Delareyville last Thursday, Telkom CEO, Sizwe Nxasana, said the GlobalStar satellite network would "take access to telecommunications to a new level -- including rural areas where the cost of infrastructure inhibits the ability of telecommunications operators to extend services as quickly as they would like". The satellite telephone handsets used on this network will be about the size of current cellular phones -- substantially smaller than existing satellite phones.
"By providing access to telecommunications, we will open the door of opportunity to people whose horizons have been severely curtailed by poverty. In this context, we have a responsibility on the African continent in particular to ensure that we provide the tools to encourage development," said Nxasana.
"Africa cannot afford to continue lagging behind other emerging economies of the world. We have to use every means at our disposal to leverage our ability to compete in the global economy," he concluded.
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