Telecom industry enters multimedia services
By I. Christianto
JAKARTA (JP): Through the rapid development in information and telecommunications technologies, people have started to change the way they communicate by applying multimedia, which is now controlled by the country's telecommunications industry.
The convergence of equipment, services and networks was inevitable. The components of equipment, which include telecommunications, computers and videos, have merged. As have the components of services which include newspaper, movies, cable television, telecommunications, publishing and broadcasting.
Customers require sophisticated services of high quality, global coverage and competitive prices. Developing countries are accelerating telecommunications development to improve service quality, expand coverage and increase penetration.
The state-owned domestic telecommunications provider PT Telkom estimated that the definite services of multimedia would be available in Indonesia by 2005 at the earliest, even though some applications like Internet, Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) and Intelligent Network (IN) facilities are already in daily use in big cities.
ISDN is, in general, a network evolving from a telephony integrated digital network that provides end-to-end digital connectivity. This then supports a wide range of services, including voice and non-voice services, to which users have access by a limited set of standard multipurpose user network interfaces. The development of ISDN began in the early 1990s.
Internet services were commercially applied in Indonesia in 1994. There are currently more than 20 Internet providers in the country, with an estimate of dozens of million of people enjoying the services.
Telkom is also set to launch later this year IN, a service facilitating information exchange through several systems.
Apart from the existing services, Telkom plans to enter the multimedia era with the aim of connecting all homes with optical fiber, replacing its conventional cable networks. The project will include fiber in the loop, fiber in the curb and fiber in home installations.
Relying on its digital and fiber-optic networks, Telkom plans to develop multimedia services in cooperation with private firms. Cooperation and alliances are a must for Telkom because multimedia service is a convergence of various items of businesses.
Telkom has signed a preliminary deal with cellular telephone operator PT Telekomindo Primabhakti and private TV station PT Rajawali Citra Televisi to develop the services. Telkom has well- prepared infrastructure potential for voice and visual image telecommunications.
Meanwhile, PT Indosat, the state-owned international telecommunications carrier, is also prepared to set up multimedia services.
Indosat plans to acquire a number of shares in PT Yasawirya Tama Cipta, a Jakarta-based private production house which provides video recordings for television broadcasting and video technical assistance.
Through participation in the Yasawirya Tama equity, Indosat, which is listed on the New York and Jakarta stock exchanges, intends to explore and develop a multimedia business.
Indosat is currently exploring the possibility of providing multimedia services in the country and has budgeted $13.5 million for 1996 for the development of a pilot network. The company is negotiating a deal with Suginamii, a Japanese broadcasting firm.
As an international telecommunications provider, Indosat has expanded access to fiber optic digital submarine cables by joining regional and worldwide cable consortia. The participation will facilitate Indosat, when it enters the multimedia service.
The company participates in several overseas projects including the Asian Pacific Cable Network, Southeast Asia-Middle East-Western Europe (Seamewe 3) and Trans Pacific cable (TPC-5).
Asian Pacific Cable Network is a consortium for the construction and operation of a fiber optic submarine cable system linking Indonesia, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan and Australia. The system will be in service in late 1996 or early 1997. TPC is a 24,500-kilometer submarine cable which will link Japan and the United States to be ready in December this year. Seamewe 3 is a consortium of several telecommunication firms which will install a new high-capacity fiber-optic submarine cable system linking Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East and western Europe. The project is expected to be in service in 1998.
Broadband
Development in technology has the ability to facilitate the multimedia service. The country has adapted digital technology which enables service integration, improved transmission quality and expanded transmission capacity.
Computer and telecommunications technology enables new service development and sophistication. Satellite technology enables worldwide coverage and multiservice transmission. Optical fiber technology provides high capacity transmission facilities.
Optical fiber prepared by the telecommunications companies will facilitate better services of the multimedia.
A senior general manager of Telkom, Suryatin Setiawan, said that Indonesia is now entering the broadband telecommunications era.
"The applications of ISDN and IN is now utilizing the narrowband, which doesn't need fiber optic. But due to the limited bandwidth we enter broadband communications."
Broadband will be necessary for the telecommunications of video, television broadcasting and high definition television.
A director of Indosat, Bambang Sulistyo, said that if a digital telephone transmission just needs 64 kilobits per second (kbps) current, the transmission of video communications will need folded 64 kbps currents.
Normally, low speed data and telephone transmission work on 64 the kbps current, while still images, video conference and television broadcasting uses megabytes and three dimensional television will use gigabits.
Participants
There are currently about three million telephone lines which were installed by Telkom, which plans to install another five million lines by 1999. The rate of telephone density is still low in Indonesia, which reaches only 1.65 lines per hundred people.
Apart from telephone networks, the utilization of customer terminals which include home televisions, direct to home televisions (satellite dishes), videocassette recorders (VCR) and personal computers should also be considered in entering the multimedia service.
There is no accurate data on the density and penetration of home television, VCR and direct to home televisions and personal computers in Indonesia.
Major participants in multimedia are content providers which include film studios, printing media, television broadcasters, production houses, news agencies and information providers like research institutes and software houses.
There are currently more than 300 printing media (newspapers, magazines and bulletins) and more than 600 commercial radio stations operating in Indonesia. There are five private television broadcasting firms currently in operation in the country.
In addition to RCTI, ANteve, SCTV, Indosiar and TPI, the government has also licensed other firms to operate television stations, including PT Merdeka Citra Televisi in Semarang, Central Java, PT Cakrawala Bumi Sriwijaya in Palembang, South Sumatra, PT Ramako Indotelevisi in Batam, Riau and PT Sanitya Mandara in Yogyakarta. However, the latter firms have not started operations since their permits were issued in the early 1990s.
In the meantime, there is currently Indovision, a company which runs cable television in the country. Through a satellite system, Indovision, an affiliate of PT Matahari Lintas Cakrawala, offers several channels of overseas programs including CNN, TNT Cartoons Network, Discovery, ESPN and HBO. A Matahari Lintas subsidiary plans to operate its own direct broadcast system satellite.
Such related businesses will support the multimedia because the convergence of equipment, services, content and networks is inevitable for the new facility.
Multimedia is one of the few dominant themes in the ongoing debates over the future of network communications.
A system of multimedia will allow people to simulate operating stores via computer networks. The participants will be able to design stores, draw up management plans and select goods to be sold. Multimedia usually comprises such things as video-on-demand and on-line shopping. But several new concepts are coming, including "edutainment" (an educational software for children to spend up learning basic skills), "telecooperation" (long-distance cooperation) and "hypermedia".