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Somaliland, February 23, 2004 (Vanguard, Nigeria) – In order to make
its tariffs more competitive and entice further subscribers to the
network, Telsom Mobile has introduced per-second billing on its
prepaid tariffs. Having launched commercial services in December, some
3000 subscribers, 95% of which are prepaid, have signed up to the new
operator so far. And Telsom Mobile's chief executive, Mohamed Sheik,
believes that with per-second billing now available across all of its
services, even more people will be encouraged to purchase a mobile
phone.
Furthermore, he says that with much of western region of the country
covered, deployment is now underway in the Eastern Region and should
be complete within two months -- bringing celllular coverage to most
of Somaliland. “We’ve been able to implement Tecore's solution as a
true real-time 'pay-for-what-you-say' feature for prepaid services --
on a per subscriber basis for all calls, across peak and off-peak
hours, every day of the week," says Sheik. "These types of customised
features allow us to compete in the market and significantly increase
our business while giving the customer more flexibility and freedom of
choice."
A joint venture company between two established telecoms service
providers in Somalia -- Somatel and Telcom Somalia -- Telsom Mobile
achieved a rapid rollout of its network in Somaliland's capital of
Hargeysa and surrounding cities -- largely due to its use of what is,
essentially, a GSM 'network in a box.'
The operator deployed an AirCore MSC from US-based Tecore Wireless
Systems -- which features pre-integrated roaming, prepaid, SMSC and
voicemail systems -- as well as AdaptaCell broadband-ready,
software-defined base stations from AirNet Communications.
"Our system provides full functionality -- including MSC, VLR, HLR,
authentication centre, prepaid system, SMSC, CAMEL functions, and
network management -- in a GSM network, but which does it in a very
small capacity that is also very scalable to a large capacity," states
Casey Joseph, cto, Tecore Wireless Systems.
"This has given operators, especially those in emerging markets such
as Telsom, all the features of a full-blown GSM system, but as a very
scalable platform, so they don't have to buy into something that they
may or may not grow into ten years from now."
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