Currently, the company is testing the Internet access, and picture-sending capability (called 1XRTT) on cell sites in Kingston.  The service will be commercially available in Kingston, first on laptops and then on phones.

"We are really planning to have an initial phase of that service out on the market the first quarter of 2005," said Alex Hill, MiPhone's chief marketing officer, at a media brief at the Pegasus Hotel in Kingston yesterday.  "That first phase will be Internet connectivity, the second phase will be Internet connectivity to the handsets - the second quarter of 2005."

This is the first time that MiPhone was announcing a specific date for the commercial launch of its service though it has been testing its system for almost a year.

MiPhone told reporters that its core cell network technology - CDMA - allows it, with a software add-on, to offer 100k speed Internet connections on phones and laptops.  This is more than twice the Internet speed that is now provided to those who are hooked up to the cellular service offered by its two competitors - Digicel, and Cable & Wireless Jamaica.  No other cell provider in Jamaica has CDMA.

Last year, MiPhone said it would spend US$2 million (J$120 million) to lay out the technology that would allow its cell customers 1XRTT access.  At the time, the company wanted to time the 1XRTT launch to coincide with the completion of its islandwide coverage.  The company did not complete the roll-out of its infrastructure in line with its plans for the dual launch.

MiPhone says it now expects to finish its build-out by year-end, allowing it to meet its licence obligation to provide 90 per cent population coverage by that date.

"We will have 63 sites by the end of the year... which would give greater than 90 per cent of Jamaica access to the service," said Courtney Grant, director of engineering at MiPhone.

MiPhone's licence was amended recently to provide 90 per cent population coverage as opposed to 90 per cent geographic coverage that had been initially specified under the terms set by the Office of Utilities Regulation - the state-run regulatory agency.  The original deadline for the company to achieve the coverage was December 2004, five years after the issuance of its licence.

Yesterday the cell company said it did not need hundreds of sites to achieve islandwide coverage, as its core cell technology spread farther than other cell providers.

This is not the first time the company announced plans to provide islandwide coverage.  Just last year chief executive officer Craig McBurnett told the Observer that MiPhone expected to complete its US$130-million islandwide set-up by December 2003.

Yesterday however, the company said that the US$30-million IDB loan which it secured in December 2003 would allow it to finish the build-out.

Hill told the Observer that 80 per cent of the loan would be used on expansion.  MiPhone said that it was meeting its loan requirements, but would not disclose details.

Hill, however, asserted that the average spend per customer was rising, as half of its new customers were corporate clients.  Corporate customers tend to spend more than residential customers, and they are attracted to the unlimited talk time plans.  The company's customer base is over the 80,000 mark.

MiPhone began offering cell phone service in Jamaica about three years ago, having paid US$45 million to the Jamaican government for the cell licence in 1999.

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/magazines/Business/html/20041028T200000-0500_68406_OBS_MIPHONE_EXPECTS_FULL_COVERAGE_BY_DECEMBER.asp