CAT To Spend 3 Billion In Broadband Network Expansion

[webfact]

CAT To Spend 3 Billion in Broadband Network Expansion

CAT Telecom has announced it will expand its broadband coverage nationwide, aiming to boost broadband revenue growth by 10 percent this year.

Senior Executive Vice President of CAT Telecom’s broadband business Sompol Chanprasert said the company plans to spend three billion baht on expansion of its broadband coverage and capacity this year.

The firm is set to expand to more than 20,000 WiFi, wireless high-speed internet access points nationwide.

This will serve at least two million users.

Sompol expects the CAT broadband business to grow by 20 percent this year and broadband usage to rise by 40 to 50 percent.

He noted that the company has set a growth target of 5 to 10 percent for broadband revenue, up from 7 billion baht last year.

He added that the firm is preparing to organize the CAT Net-work Showcase 2011 on April 27 and 28 at Queen Sirikit National Convention Center.

The event will be held under the concept, “Life Work Play Experience” to present CAT’s potency to provide full-scale broadband services and announce its market strategies as well as promotional campaigns for the year.

-- Tan Network 2011-04-21

[Phil Conners]

2 million new users in Thailand + unchanged international bandwidth = not happy smiley.

[wpcoe]

Yeah, I wondered about that spending "on expansion of its broadband coverage and capacity."

If by expanding broadband capacity, they were including the enlarging of the international gateways, it'd be something to get excited about. However, I (cynically) doubt that's what they mean.

[nikster]

WiFi hotspots?

Total waste of money... I sometimes try to use the True WiFi hotspots as it's free on my mobile. The problem is they are way slower than the 3G, and sometimes downright unusable.

They should spend their money building out Fiber optical networks and DSL lines instead.

BTW I don't think there's currently a shortage of international bandwidth but I suspect it's just too expensive to sell at the prices the DSL providers offer access, and so they buy less, and accept the congestion.

If you think about it, that's going to happen no matter how much international bandwidth is available, at least as long as that international bandwidth isn't dirt cheap.

If I can rent a 1MB dedicated line out of thailand for X amount of money, then I have the option to either put 10 users on it for 5000 / month, or 100 users for 500/month... what's going to make more profits? The vast majority of users are casual web surfers - they want cheap access, and are willing to accept less than perfect quality.

If you want bandwidth, you have to pay for it. My 5Mbit Premier 3BB package is dam_n expensive, but it actually delivers 5Mbit any time of the day / night, and I have crystal clear skype conversations all of a sudden - previously I had blamed the lag, but I guess it was line quality!.

[Phil Conners]

Yeah we've had that Premier discussion many times before. I had 3BB Premier 3M/1M for 1,266/m (or something like that). Yes I pretty much had that 3M download speed most of the time, the 1M upload was less often there. I switched to 3BB Standard 8M/1M for 888/m, and yes it does vary a little, I don't always get 8M but so far I have always had more than 3M so I don't complain.

I personally think the Premier account is just another farang-price.

[wpcoe]

Phil, I'm still clinging on to my 3M/1M Premier plan grandfathered at B1,000/mo.

The only thing keeping me from "downgrading" to a cheaper, faster non-Premier plan is the experience with my original TT&T MaxNet@Home package several years ago. With that plan, I would consistently get the full speed up and down. For the first couple years, that is. Then, the throughput became slower and/or less reliable. My suspicion is that for the first few years my contention ratio was low, but later additional and/or more-demanding users came to share my connection. I'd hate to let that happen again, as the current Premier plans are priced way too high.

Every time you report your success, I'm more and more tempted to switch my plan from Premier. Probably, when my current six-month prepaid package (for the 5% discount) expires, I'll take the plunge? Probably...

[Phil Conners]

Yeah, I guess it's always a gamble. Of course I can't make any guarantees that it'll be the same for you or that it will stay that way, just telling you my experience so far...