PSN to install satellite phones in villages

JAKARTA (JP): Satellite telecommunications service provider PT Pasifik Satelit Nusantara (PSN) disclosed on Monday plans to provide satellite phone services to more than 50,000 villages nationwide by the end of next year.

PSN president Adi R. Adiwoso said the company had distributed its satellite phones to 500 villages across the country for technical trials and would officially launch the service in July.

The service, called Install Your Own Telephone, abbreviated as Pasti in Indonesian, is being provided to villages which have yet to gain access to the telephone services provided by state telecommunications company PT Telkom or the country's cellular phone operators.

Adi said 80 percent of the more than 60,000 villages in the country still did not have access to a telephone service.

"From our technical trials, it was discovered that a phone could be used for more than 30 minutes a day in the villages, that's a fairly high usage rate," he told reporters at a media conference held during the Asia Pacific Telecom 2001 (Aspactel) exhibition here.

PSN director of operations Rian Alisjahbana said each satellite phone unit cost about Rp 8 million (about US$727), including a Rp 3.5 million pre-paid phone card.

"The system is pre-paid so people can really control their spending," he said, adding that the phone cards could be refilled at PSN's eight distributors.

The refilling service would soon be available at various stores close to the villages.

Refilling would be available for between Rp 50,000 and Rp 500,000 worth of usage, Rian explained.

Rian said PSN hoped that eventually every household in Indonesia would own one of its satellite phones, but for the moment it was targeting at least one phone per village.

Adi said that each conversation using a satellite phone would cost about Rp 1,500 per minute for local calls and Rp 2,500 per minute for long distance calls. Local calls covered all areas in the province where the village was situated, while long distance calls covered areas outside the province.

PT Asia Cellular Satellite (ACeS), with which PSN is affiliated, has expressed interest in the system, Adi said, adding that it had agreed to market the product across Asia.

ACeS is co-owned by PSN, American firm Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications, the Philippines' Long Distance Telephone Company and Jasmine International of Thailand.

Adi, who is also the president and CEO of ACeS, said that to date countries such as the Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan, and India had agreed to stage technical trials for the system.

"There is a potential market of 1.2 million villages without access to telephones across Asia," he added. (tnt)