Affordable cellular phones coming soon
JAKARTA (JP): People living in the greater Jakarta area will soon find the prices of mobile telecommunications devices more affordable as PT Telepoint Nusantara plans to launch their Silverlink, a new Motorola handphone with a Rp 800,000 (US$366) price tag.
"One thing is for sure, the Silverlink price will not exceed one million rupiahs and its rates will also be lower than what other cellular phones charge," said F.A. Ali Chendra, the managing director of PT Telepoint Nusantara yesterday.
According to Ali, the company will make 60,000 Silverlinks available to the Greater Jakarta public sometime around April or May of next year.
Ali said that PT Telepoint Nusantara (PT TN) will charge the Silverlink owner around Rp 30,000 each month for the subscription fee while using the standard billing system of PT Telkom, the state-owned telecommunications company, at around Rp 100 every three minutes.
He said that the estimated price of the Silverlink is already adjusted with government taxes, adding that Silverlink is not a celullar phone.
The price of celullar phones in Indonesia ranges from Rp 6 million to Rp 9 million. The companies dealing with cellular phones charge around Rp 1,000 per three minutes.
"Actually, Silverlink is not like a cellular phone, a telephone used to make incoming and outgoing calls. Silverlink is different and designed to make outgoing calls only," he said.
He said that Silverlink, however, could also be used as a two- way telecommunication device because since it also acts as a pager. He said that two-way communication will be possible through the pager company.
Jakarta area
Ali explained that people who want to make a call to Silverlink owners should call the paging company first. The company will then hold their calls while it notifies the Silverlink owner to call the company where a call will be waiting for them.
"If the Silverlink owners intend to answer the call then the company will merge the two calls together. If they don't, the company can simply transfer it to the answering machine," he said.
He added that for the time being, Silverlink can only be used for telephone conversations within the greater Jakarta area, except in Bogor, a town 60 kilometers to the south in W. Java.
Ali said that PT TN planned to market Silverlink phones in the country's 27 provinces after installing 5,000 telepoints, special transmitters, throughout the greater Jakarta area.
He said that the company's total investment is around US$10 million, 80 percent of which went to finance the installation of the telepoints in the greater Jakarta area.
Ali added that the company will also provide journalists covering the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Jakarta and Bogor next month with Silverlink models.
Meanwhile, Chew Guan Sing, the South Asia Sales Director of Motorola Electronics Pte. Ltd, said that Silverlink is the solution for people who want to keep informed but do not want to be disturbed by incoming calls.
He said Silverlink is already widely used by many in China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Thailand.(mas)