Neotel going wireless

[Dave A]

It seems Neotel, our great hope to shake Telkom's stranglehold on us, is going wireless for connectivity.

I'll be honest - I'm not sure I'm happy to hear this. That way, their real competitors are the cellular networks, and I can't see much changing at Telkom.

Mind you, some serious hustle on the cellular rates wouldn't hurt.

[duncan drennan]

Well, as a whole Telkom and the cellular networks are already in competition (except Telkom owns a large stake in the one...)

Their wireless route enables them to get their hardware in place much faster (just sent the phone/modem/endpoint to the client). In a lot of ways it is comparable to iBurst, but they will have infrastructure to appear like a fixed line operator. What they are doing is creating a wireless local loop (last mile) connection.

[SilverNodashi]

Neotel has yet to reveal their prices, and they've postponed it too many times already. I'm beginning to think this is a joke, it's all about the glamor, but they don't have the service to back them up

[Dave A]

It looks like a patch job to me. I thought they were going to be a fixed line operator. And if they rolled out a cable quality network, they could really get Telkom on the back foot. Maybe they just aren't prepared to (or can't) commit that amount of capital.

What worries me about wireless is that it is easily oversold - and we've seen what happens then too many times already.

[duncan drennan]

Neotel launched their consumer product on Thursday. Pricing and details on MyBroadband.

[Marq]

Seems that Telkom and Vodakom are bedding down wimax (last mile) systems with setups in CT Dbn and Jhb already running. This wireless stuff requires a huge investment and structural input which I do not see Neotel doing. G2,G3 wimax etc

I think its a patch job as well - lets have a poll (or bets) on how long this consortium lasts.

[Marq]

Before you bet, have a look at the makeup of the Neotel Director board.

• 3 guys (its seems the main positions MD/FD/Ops) are Tata Representatives
• 1 Guy from Transnet
• 1 from Telekoms in Namibia representing Communitel which represents the MKhonto we sizwe military veterans association.
• 2 Guys from (this is where you do not hedge your bets either)... Eskom

So who is really running this show off this exciting list? Our government with its brilliant enterprise management track record or the guys from India.

mmmmm.....this could make telkom look good; something you thought would never happen; or is it just another gameplan to keep telkom alive forever?

[duncan drennan]

Neotel has gone live with their service offering.