Batam has adequate supply of telephone lines: Telkom

Batam has adequate supply of telephone lines: Telkom

BATAM ISLAND, Riau (JP): Batam, an island developed as an
export processing zone and tourist resort in the Riau
archipelago, has enough telephone lines to support rapid growth
of businesses, a telecommunications executive said.

Batam has 12,400 telephone lines which are now ready for
marketing, out of the 25,500 lines that Telkom has installed, the
chief of the Batam office of PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia
(Telkom), Totok Subiyanto, said here yesterday.

He told reporters after attending a ceremony marking the
cooperation agreement between Telkom and Bank Internasional
Indonesia (BII) that Telkom operates telephone exchanges with a
total capacity of 19,500 lines and a Global System for Mobile
Communications (GSM) facility with a capacity of 6,000 lines on
the island, which is located a mere 20 kilometers south of
Singapore.

Because Telkom has thus far sold only 12,800 fixed telephone
lines and 300 lines of the GSM facility, 6,700 fixed telephone
lines and 5,700 mobile telephone lines are now available for
marketing, he said.

He explained that Telkom will expand its transmission networks
to increase sales of its fixed telephone lines and offer GSM
lines to business executives operating in Batam and its
surrounding islands.

Construction

"We expect to complete construction of the telecommunications
networks in early 1995," he said.

Some 2,000 companies and families are now eagerly awaiting
telephone lines in the Batam area.

Batam and its surrounding islands are part of the Triangle of
Growth which also includes Singapore and Malaysia's Johor state.
Industrial estates and international tourist resorts have been
established on Batam and Bintan Islands. Batam's airport is also
being expanded to accommodate wide-body aircraft.

Totok acknowledged that sales of the GSM lines, which started
in early July, have been slow due to technical reasons.

The GSM facility in Batam is the first of its kind to be
developed in Indonesia. The second GSM facility is now being
established in Jakarta by PT Satelindo, a joint venture of
Telkom, PT Indosat, the state-owned international
telecommunications company, and PT Bima Graha, a subsidiary of PT
Bimantara Citra.

Totok said that because Telkom competes with firms in
Singapore, the costs of installing telephone lines and services
in Batam are priced competitively.

The installation fee for a fixed-telephone line, for example,
is set at Rp 500,000, as compared to Rp 1 million in Jakarta and
Rp 750,000 in Bandung, West Java.

An executive of Ericsson of Sweden, Sumarlis, said that a
hand-held GSM telephone in Batam sells for about Rp 2 million
(US$921), as compared to S$2,400 ($1,548) for a similar product
in Singapore.

Nine brands of cellular telephones -- Ericsson, Setelco,
Siemens, Pioneer, Philips, Audio Fox, Bosch, Hagenuk and Motorola
-- are sold in Batam.

Payment

Telkom's director of finance, Muljohardjoko, who inked the
agreement with BII's vice president, Hidajat Tjandradjaja, said
that Telkom's subscribers can now pay for telecommunications
services by Visa or Mastercard.

"The cooperation is meant to facilitate payments for telephone
line installation and other services. An expanded number of
counters will accept credit cards," Muljohardjoko said.

He added that under the agreement, Telkom will pay BII for the
credit card service. He declined to elaborate on the fees.

Currently 12 payment points serve customers in Batam. (02)