Thu, 07 Dec 2000

Telkom to begin mobile telephone services next year

JAKARTA (JP): State-owned domestic telephone operator PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia (Telkom) will join the ranks of cellular phone network providers in 2001, an executive said on Thursday.

Telkom's head of investor relations, Setiawan Sulistyono, said the company's cellular service would be launched officially in August 2001.

"For the first stage Telkom intends to install 200,000 lines covering Greater Jakarta, Bandung and Bandar Lampung," he told The Jakarta Post.

Telkom will enter the market using the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) at 1800 Megahertz, Setiawan said, adding that the infrastructure would be built by PT Siemens Indonesia.

Siemens, a German-based communications company, won the 62.7 million euro and Rp 28.8 billion (US$3 million) contract tender held by Telkom in August, he said. The tender involved six big names in telecommunications: Motorola, Ericsson, Nokia, Siemens, Lucent and Alcatel.

Setiawan said Telkom invested about Rp 90.5 billion this year to begin its cellular project.

"The cost of each line initially is $600 a line, but it will gradually become cheaper to about $400 a line because we will merge it with the existing Telkom infrastructure," he said.

Setiawan said Telkom expects to install 400,000 lines within two years of the initial launch, with the number of customers predicted to reach 495,000 within three years.

Telkom's vice president for corporate communications, D. Amarudien, said Telkom would enter the market with its prepaid and postpaid subscriber identity module (SIM) cards, which would enable customers to use the general packet radio services (GPRS).

GPRS enables high-speed mobile datacom usage, which is useful for data applications such as mobile Internet browsing, e-mail and push technologies. GPRS has been demonstrated to achieve speeds of up to 115 kilobits per second.

Currently there are three GSM-900 operators in the country: PT Telkomsel with its Kartu Halo postpaid SIM card and Simpati prepaid card; PT Excelcomindo Pratama with its proXL SIM card; and PT Satelindo with the Satelindo postpaid card and Mentari prepaid card.

Other cellular operators in Indonesia are Telesera, Metrosel and Komselindo, which operate under the Advanced Mobile Phone System, and Mobisel, which operates under the Nordic Mobile Telephone System.

PT Indosat recently revealed plans to enter the cellular market next year. It also will operate under the GSM-1800 system. (tnt)