Portability of your phones-merging of landline with Mobile at an affordable price is the wish of citizens world over.  Especially Kiwis, with lot of outdoor activities  and facilities would want to have  the technologies that make them mobile on internent , telephone and mobile.  But be prepared to accept the challenges posed to you by Telecom. 

 

VOIP  (Voice over Internet Protocol)  is the technology taking world telecom companies by storm in the last 3 to 5 years. It provides mobile access line nos which could be used over internent anywhere you want. British telecom companies have the answer to any new technology.  Adopt them and give the benefit to customers.  NZ  and Australian Telecom companies say, "Sorry, wait till we stabilise our revenue and after we understand the technology, then we can even think about giving it to you."

 

Result New Zealand and Australia are lagging behind in the drive to merge home phones and mobiles because of slow broadband speeds and low uptake.

"The sort of convergence strategies that people are moving towards, particularly in Europe ... really do rely on significantly higher [speeds]" than are offered here,  David Kennedy, senior telecommunications analyst of the Asia Pacific region for Ovum, said in a report 

Telephone companies around the world, including Telecom, are moving to merge home phones and mobiles into one device in an effort to stop declining traditional calling revenue.

The goal is to offer customers bundled packages of the two services, and ultimately a single dual-mode handset that functions like a fixed line at home and as a mobile outside.

British Telecom introduced a dual-mode handset - called Fusion - last year, while Telecom last week announced a business restructure designed to work toward such convergence.

Telecom has said it doesn't plan to introduce dual-mode handsets this year, and Kennedy doesn't see a mass-market rollout happening until well into 2007. Other countries in the Asia Pacific region, such as Singapore and Korea, will get there sooner.

"By global standards, what we in Australia and New Zealand call broadband isn't that fast. That issue has to be addressed if we're going to keep up with other countries" in rolling out converged phones.

Uptake is also a problem - New Zealand only has about eight broadband subscribers per 100 people, while Australia has nearly 14, ranking the countries 22nd and 17th respectively among the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's 30 member countries.

Dual-mode handsets are dependent on a fast broadband connection because they use voice over internet protocol (VoIP). In Australia, average download speeds are 512 kilobits per second, while about 60 per cent of Telecom's broadband connections were at 256 kilobits as of December.

Kennedy said a good VoIP connection needed at least 144 kilobits, which would use up most of that speed.

"If you've got one person on the phone already and somebody else in another room picks up their phone and starts talking over the same service, then there really isn't going to be a lot left for anything else at that point."

Telstra in Australia and Telecom have acknowledged this problem and it's why both are looking into upgrading their networks through investment in faster ADSL2+ technology, he said.

"That opens up all the possibilities of all sorts of convergent offerings, not just fixed-mobile convergence but things like triple-play [television] strategies."

Chris Loh, telecommunications analyst for IDC, said the building blocks for fixed-mobile convergence were rapidly falling into place. Telecom's ADSL2+ plans and looming Government regulation, which is expected to open up broadband competition, were likely to improve the speed and uptake issues.

"Certainly that's going to build on our already ramping penetration. It's only ever going to get better."

Loh said the fixed-mobile convergence strategy was also "compelling" for Telecom if it was to head off a counter "fixed-mobile substitution" strategy from rival Vodafone.

The company plans to introduce similar dual-mode phones that operate independent of Telecom's network by the end of the year.

 

Companies like Woosh, starting on non-conventional broadband(Radiowave signals) connections are trying to bypass this traditional fixed line monopoly.  Mobile phone technology  should also depend on telecom for mobile to landline calls. That is where the technology is blocked by Telecom by fixing high charges for competitiors to introudce convenient services to customers. Our Commerce Commission ruling in favour of telecom about local line unbundling a few years ago is hitting us. Only now the Government realised this problem and  ordering Telecom to unbundle the lines to competitors.  To solve this problem, the technology available is  VOiP.  For example take your phone anywhere you want. Plug into any internent connection.  Log into your phone no. and start making calls world over that will cost you one fifth of the traditional call rates.

 

This technology and service is readily available even in Asian Countries but we won't have them at least until 2007 .  Once lagging behind in technology it will be years to catch up  and you already lost international compeititiveness.  This is where Australia and New Zealand are standing now.True underdogs in telecom infrastructure.

 

O.K., there is another way out, United States found out that cable t.v connections can be used as broadband connections.  Think about our big fellow there, SKY TV, Already priced to the max for its services,in conjunction with Business philosophies of Telecom, it is not an alternative for us, the unsophisticated Kiwis.

 

We can't think like United States, or even Singapore in telecommunication.  We are only allowed to think like Telecom.  Previously Commerce Commission said it was not monopoly. We have no comments.