Electrindo and Alcatel form international joint venture

JAKARTA (JP): Indonesian telecommunications firm PT Elektrindo Nusantara has set up an international joint venture to install and maintain underwater cables.

Elektrindo, an arm of the Bimantara group, has tied up with France's Alcatel Submarine Network and Japanese trading house Tomen Co.

Alcatel Submarine is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Alcatel Alsthom, a manufacturer and supplier of underwater telecommunications systems.

Elektrindo president director Harry Kuntoro said the joint venture, PT Nusantara Submarine Cable Service, was the first firm in Indonesia to engage in underwater cable maintenance.

The joint venture was agreed on in Paris last December.

It is 52 percent owned by Alcatel Submarine, 43 percent by Elektrindo and 5 percent by Tomen Co.

Elektrindo and Tomen cooperated to install underwater cables in the 1980s in Indonesia but not been active for a long time, he said.

Harry said he was optimistic about the firm's prospects because Indonesia planned to lay a large submarine telecommunications network, and there was currently only one maintenance service operating in South East Asia.

This service, South East Asia In Ocean Cable Maintenance, is partially owned by state-owned telecommunication firms PT Indosat and PT Telkom, had only two vessels to maintain the region's underwater cables, Harry said.

He said Nusantara Submarine would not buy vessels but charter them.

A vessel designed for laying and maintaining underwater cables costs US$40 million, while the charter fee for a vessel was between $50,000 and $100,000 a day, he said.

The joint venture will spend $5 million setting up facilities throughout Indonesia and would spend more for the operation.

The facilities will first be operated with some foreign technicians but Alcatel has agreed that Indonesian technicians will replace them in three years.

The firm planned to bid jointly for the Telkom's project to lay 2,000 kilometer cables between Ambon and Jayapura. (jsk)