Syahrial Ali’s Blog

Archive for the ‘News’ Category

As informed by DG Postel, all cellular and FWA operators in Indonesia have passed the standard Quality of Service for the year of 2009. The measurement has been performed from July to August last year  in the six cities, namely: Jakarta, Bandung, Surabaya, Makasar, Medan and Batam.

As written in the previous post Indonesian Cellular QoS Rule, the measurement items are:   Call Center Service Level, Endpoint Service Availability which include call success rate, drop call and block call, and SMS service level.

Starting from 2010, Indonesian telecommunication regulator will fine operators which do not pass the standard quality of service.

Below are the measurement result.

Source: DG Postel
CSR: Call Success Rate
FWA: Fixed Wireless Access.

According to the data, Mobile-8, a CDMA operator, was the most performed network, both for Fren (cellular) and Hepi (FWA). Its total subscriber was only around 3m by the end of 2008.  Meanwhile, HCPT with its product call “3″, was the less perfromed network followed by Smart Telecom. HCPT is GSM/3G operator, while Smart Telecom is a CDMA operator.

The Indonesian Ministry of Communication and Information Technology announced last Tuesday that it is investigating telecommunications companies that do business with Israel.

This announcement came the day after the communication and information technology minister disclosed that Amdocs was being excluded from a local tender because the controlling shareholders are Israeli.

The Jakarta Globe reported that on Monday Communications and Information Technology Minister Tifatul Sembiring said that Amdocs should not be included in the billing tender of Indonesian cellular service provider Telkom PT because Amdocs has Israeli shareholders. A spokesman said the ministry will investigate Israeli-affiliated telecommunications companies and sanction those found to be in violation of the regulation.

Sembiring is a member of PKS, the conservative Islamic Prosperous Justice Party, and said excluding Amdocs from the tender was justified because Israel has no diplomatic relations with Indonesia.

The newspaper also noted the criticism from a local consumer organization, whose analyst called Sembiring’s action “irrelevant” and unwise. The analyst said that Israeli technology was commonly used in the information-technology sector because Israel is a major producer of high-tech components, and Indonesia imports 90% of the telecommunication parts used in the country.

“Many of these could be from Israeli manufacturers or come from companies with Israeli shareholders,” he said. “How about products from Taiwan? Many of our telecommunications products are from Taiwan – another country that does not have diplomatic relations with Indonesia.”  (taken from: Haaretz.com)

According to the data released by DG Postel, Telkomsel is the highest payer of spectrum frequency fee. Up until end of June 2009, Telkomsel has paid just above IDR 1.6 trillion, which consist of Rp. 929b (900 MHz) and Rp. 724b (1800 MHz). Indosat comes second with IDR 940b, followed by XL with IDR 700b. Bakrie is the highest payer for CDMA operator with IDR 230b. The total spectrum fee until end of June is IDR 4.2 trillion.

Currently DG Postel released a consultation for spectrum fee based license. The white paper has been released. It can be downloaded here.

The pressure to spectrum fee stuck up since a few years ago. This was triggered with the cost that must be paid using current system, apparatus license. In this scheme, as written in the previous posting Indonesian Spectrum Levy, operator will pay as they build new equipments which use spectrum frequency. From time to time, the figures will increase and nowadays it has become so high. Just take Telkomsel for example. It has 2×30Mhz spectrum in 900MHz and 1800MHz. Until June 09, they have already paid, IDR 1.6 trillion or more than IDR 26b per MHz. This figure is far higher than 3G spectrum fee, with just IDR 16b per MHz.

The purpose this consultation is to make an equal treatment for all industry which uses the spectrum frequency. However, for the time being the focus is the cellular industry in which spectrum frequency is the vital element of the business. In this consultation, people are encourage to submit their comment to the DG Postel, from Oct 16th to the end of the month.

PT. Indonesia Comnets Plus (ICON+), a national electric company (PLN) subsidiary has succeeded in winning the two remaining USO packets, namely packet no 4 and no 5. The packets no 4 consists of North Sulawesi , Gorontalo, Central Sulawesi, West Sulawesi, South Sulawesi, South East Sulawesi, Maluku and North Maluku. While the packet 5 consists of Papua and  West Irian Jaya.

In packet 4, ICON+ was competing with Indonusa System Integrator Prima, while in packet 5 ICON+ is only participant. ICON+ won the contract for IDR 274b (USD 270m) and IDR 455b (USD 450m) for packet 4 and packet 5 respectively.

When the last 2 packets have been assigned, it means all USO packets have been tendered out. Below are the winners of the other 5 USO packets which all are won by Telkomsel.

Paket 1 consists of Aceh, North Sumatera and West Sumatera in the area of Sumatera. Winner: Telkomsel, price: IDR 553b.

The packet-2 consists of Jambi, Riau mainland , Riau islands , Bangka Belitung Islands , Bengkulu , South Sumatera, and Lampung . Winner: Telkomsel, price: IDR 333b

Packet 3: Kalimantan area, consists of West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan, East Kalimantan and South Kalimantan. Winner: Telkomsel, price: IDR 365b

Packet 6 consist of Bali, Nusa Tenggara Barat and Nusa Tenggara Timur. Winner: Telkomsel, price: IDR 209b.

Packet-7 consists of Banten, West Java, Central Java, DIY and East Java. Winner: Telkomsel, price: IDR 201b.

According to Indosat (ISAT) Annual Share Holder Meeting that was performed today,  there are several changes in the board of directors and commissioners of PT Indosat Tbk. Harry Sasongko, ex General Money (GE) Money finance director has appointed as Indosat President Director replacing Johny Swandi Sjam.

In board of commissioners, there are 2 new names in board of directors namely Peter Kuncenwicz and Steve Hobbs. Meanwhile Fadzri Sentosa and Kaizad Bomi Heerjee remain in their position. All replacement will be effective starting on August 2009.

In board of commissioners, there is one new names, i.e.  Richard F Seney, while the government representative are  Rionald Silaban and Jarman.

Board of Commissioners 2008-2019 :

- H.E Shiekh Abdullah Mohammed Bin Saud Al Thani, as Chief Commissioner.
- Dr Nasser Marafih, Commissioner
- Rahmat Gobel, Commissioner
- Jarman, Commissioner
- Soeprapto, Independent Commissioner
- Setyanto P Santosa, Independent Commissioner
- Michael Latimer, Independent Commissioner
- George Thia Peng Heok, Independent Commissioner

Board of Directors 2009-2010 :

- Harry Sasongko, President Director

- Peter Kuncewwicz, Director

- Fadzri Sentosa, Director

- Kaizad Bomii Heerjee, Director

- Steve Hobbs, Director

I found this interesting news from www.telecommagazine.com that wrote the this issue.  Hutchinson Telecommunications (HTIL) which also operates outside Hong Kong to offer mobile services in six other countries in Asia is planning to exit from Indonesia. HTIL offers mobile services in Indonesia through Hutchinson CP Telecommunications (HCPT), a joint venture with CP Group of Indonesia under product name “Three” (3).

‘Negative factors’ were reportedly cited for its decision which included ‘complicated regulatory risks.’ The joint venture operates 2G and 3G platform in Indonesia and has a subscriber base of 3.6 million as at September 2008 giving it a market share of 2.8 percent.

In December 2007, Indonesia invoked its anti-monopoly laws against Temasek Holdings, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund manager, for its indirect holdings in two telcos, Indosat and PT Telkomsel. The stakes in the two Indonesian telcos were owned by two Singapore entities – one, a fully owned investment unit, ST Telemedia and the other is publicly-listed, Singapore Telecommunications Limited, in which Temasek has substantial interests. Following unsuccessful appeal in May 2008, ST Telemedia sold its stake in Indosat to Qtel, Qatar Telecom.

Although this article was written in last January, the issue is still new for Indonesian Telecommunication communities.