Broadband penetration in Jamaica is six per cent, but Digicel believes it can cross this next 'digital divide' by mounting its WiMAX wireless antenna on its existing cellular masts, which cover 98 per cent of the island.

Unlike Cable & Wireless Jamaica and Flow, Digicel owns neither copper nor fibre wires to deliver fixed line ADSL or broadband Internet, respectively.

"We believe that mobility in broadband will be the next big thing," chief executive officer David Hall told Sunday Business.

"We have huge plans in Jamaica to do with Internet and broadband what we did with mobiles and it is very important that we do this from a consumer perspective."

Well placed

The dominant cellular provider with 1.6 million customers in Jamaica, Digicel believes it is well placed to compete against C&WJ, which covers 70 per cent of the population via its copper wire infrastructure, and Flow which is still in the early ages of roll-out.

"Flow has said that it will pass 100,000 households (by December 31) and Cable & Wireless has the same amount of ADSL ports, but they are going to the same households," said Magnus Johansson, Digicel's head of Wireless & Broadband Internet Provider Services.

"Like with GSM, we are looking at where people live, and where they are willing and able to spend on broadband we will put coverage."

Digicel now delivers its business WiMAX service in Kingston, Spanish Town, Portmore, Mandeville and Montego Bay.  Its residential service will initially be targetted at the same areas, said Johansson.

Digicel is also optimistic of the potential for mobile broadband, which is technology being pioneered in South Korea and will not likely reach Jamaica until 2008/9.  This will play an even bigger role in expanding Internet access, he said.

"Then you get the concept of personal broadband when right now its a premise based broadband.  You get the ADSL, you get the broadband, but if your neighbour does not and you go round there, then you are out of luck but with this.  The broadband goes with you," he said.

The telecoms has taken notice of reports out of the United Kingdom and United States last year that laptops were outselling desktop computers.

It indicates, said Johannson, that mobility is being increasingly prioritised by consumers.

The Digicel executive outlined four problems still facing the local Internet market: insufficient competition; high prices and contract inflexibility; limited network coverage; and a deficiency of online content related to Jamaica.

"We want to be content aggregator and for our platform to enable that.  How we do that will be our business for a while but we want to create an entrepreneurial spirit," he said.

He declined to say whether Digicel would offer free hosting for Jamaican content providers or whether the company would be packaging discounted computers with Internet services.

However, Johannson said Digicel will offer post-paid as well as pre-paid price plans to residential customers with speeds of up to two megabytes per second.

Emphasising speed

The company is keen to move away from emphasising speed of service, of which Flow is the market leader in residential Internet, offering speeds of up to six Mb/S.

Rather, said Chris Hayman, Digicel head of business services, the telecoms hopes to concentrate the market on the utility and that people will begin concentrating on the utility and mobility of the product, especially when wireless cellular phones reach the Jamaican market.

"People talk about speed but not about educating people about what broadband can do.  But, it's a value-driven product.  You only have to look at the iPod from a value perspective and that has replaced the stereo unit, and now Apple is saying they are looking at the iPhone," said Hayman.

"Increasingly people with cellular handsets ask and recognise certain features of the phone, and with WiMAX it will come down to the utility of the device that will determine its popularity," he said.

article link