Telecom Fiji Helps Vanuatu Counterpart Access Remote Areas

Text of report by news portal Fijilive website on 2 July

Telecom Fiji Ltd (TFL) has recently assisted Vanuatu Telecom in providing telecommunication services to remote customers through its VTSAT hub based in Yaqara.

Like Fiji, Vanuatu has customers in remote areas, whose only means of access to telecommunication services is via satellite. In Fiji, TFL has successfully addressed the provisioning of voice and Internet services to its remote areas using satellite technology through its world class 11 metre earth station located at Yaqara, west of Fiji.

TFL’s manager corporate affairs Salote Uluinaceva said two years ago TFL made a substantial investment in its upgrading of the VTSAT service through it’s partnership with Gilat using its Sky Edge technology. She said through sharing access to the TFL hub, Vanuatu had been able to greatly benefit from a low entry cost for the provision of its own VSAT service to its remote customers.

“Through the purchase of their own gateway terminal, Telecom Vanuatu can connect their most remote customers directly into their public switched network and provide broadband internet at prices that could never be achieved if they had to purchase their own infrastructure,” Uluinaceva said. She said Telecom Vanuatu initially expected to use their initial VSAT terminal purchase for their own use but quickly discovered that the remote resorts were clamouring for the service.

“The pent up demand was overwhelming. So today when someone in the Bluegrass resort (Vanuatu) makes a call to mainland Vanuatu, the initial call goes via the IntelSat 180deg satellite used by TFL, then managed by the Yaqara hub is routed back to the gateway satellite terminal located at the Vanuatu earth station and into the public switched network,” Uluinaceva said.

“So when the conversation takes place, it becomes a VSat to VSat call, which ensures the highest quality voice service. It achieves this through mesh technology.”

Uluinaceva said remote resorts and businesses in Vanuatu had long awaited reliable voice and Internet services (VOIP) and were now available to them using the TFL VTSAT hub.

TFL’s acting chief executive officer Taito Tabaleka said: “TFL is proud to be able to assist Vanuatu in providing affordable telecommunication services to its remote areas”. He added: “We are very much aware of the huge investment costs involved in rolling out a satellite based VSAT service and it makes good commercial sense for us to assist Vanuatu Telecom in its focus in making telecommunications available to as many customers as possible.”

Originally published by Fijilive website, Suva, in English 2 Jul 08.

(c) 2008 BBC Monitoring Asia Pacific. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.