Kabelvision sees revenues reaching Rp 400 billion<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Cable television company, Kabelvision, expects
\nto book total revenues of about Rp 400 billion (about US$42
\nmillion) this year, far higher than the Rp 60 billion recorded in
\n2000, thanks to the company's massive expansion program.<\/p>\n
Kabelvision's president Handoko A. Tanuadji said on Wednesday
\nthe expansion of its cable networks and broadband Internet
\nservices would boost the number of household subscribers to
\n200,000 from about 40,000 at present.<\/p>\n
\"Kabelvision currently has about 40,000 household subscribers
\nin Jakarta and Surabaya. By the end of the year, we expect to
\ngain about 200,000 household subscribers,\" he told journalists at
\nthe launching of Kabelvision's broadband Internet service here.<\/p>\n
He said the figure did not include the company's corporate
\nsubscribers.<\/p>\n
The company has also just begun operations in Denpasar, Bali,
\nand by the end of the year, will expand to Bandung, Semarang and
\nMedan, he said.<\/p>\n
Handoko said the broadband Internet service was becoming more
\npopular because the telephone tariff was still too high for most
\nof the country's household Internet users.<\/p>\n
To date there are approximately two million Internet users in
\nthe country, with only 13 percent accessing the Internet from
\ntheir own homes, according to a survey by AC Nielsen.<\/p>\n
Broadband Internet connection, which eliminates high phone
\nbills, will encourage people to subscribe to it, Handoko said.<\/p>\n
Kabelvision, working together in a revenue sharing scheme with
\nsix Internet service providers (ISP) -- LinkNet, IndosatNet, CBN,
\nCentrin, UniNet and M-Web -- charges Internet users a
\nsubscription fee of about Rp 300,000 a month.<\/p>\n
\"The monthly billing may vary between ISPs,\" Handoko said.<\/p>\n
A Kablevision subscriber can upgrade his membership to include
\nInternet connection by subscribing to one of the ISPs, he said.<\/p>\n
In addition to a monthly charge, a customer will also need to
\nbuy or rent a cable-modem to access the Internet. M-Web and
\nIndosatNet offer customers a choice of buying or renting the
\ncable-modem, while the other four ISPs require customers to buy
\ntheir own cable-modem, which costs around Rp 2.4 million per
\nunit.<\/p>\n
To access the broadband service, customers will also need a
\npersonal computer with an ethernet card (10Base-T) to connect
\ntheir computers to the cable televison network with a speed of up
\nto 10 million bits per second.<\/p>\n
Handoko said that while a subscriber of Kabelvision has the
\nchoice of not subscribing to broadband Internet service, it does
\nnot work the other way around.<\/p>\n
\"We have not been able to block television broadcasts from our
\nbroadband Internet service, therefore we require Internet
\nsubscribers to also subscribe to cable television,\" he said,
\nexplaining that Internet connection was only possible with a
\ncable-modem.<\/p>\n
Kabelvision has invested an additional $2 million in setting
\nup the Internet connection service, Handoko said, adding that the
\nmoney was to add a cable-modem termination system (CMTS) to the
\nexisting infrastructure. CMTS provides high-speed data transfer
\nover cable television systems.<\/p>\n
\"(That) brings our total investment to around $50 million,\" he
\nsaid.<\/p>\n
Kabelvision, owned by publicly listed PT Broadband Multimedia
\n-- a subsidiary of the Lippo Group -- was established in 1994.
\n(tnt)<\/p>",
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