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13
April 2010 |
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Vodacom is stepping up its fight with rivals MTN and Cell C by introducing "free" on-network weekend and after-hours minutes to its contract subscribers from 1 May 2010. "Vodacom contract customers will receive up to three hours of free calls to use over weekends or weekday nights to call other Vodacom customers," the company says. "Most customers on contract packages will now get a more minutesђ bundle to use during weekends or weekday nights from 8pm-7am," Vodacom says. "The allocated free minutes are ... |
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8
April 2010 |
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Cellular company MTN South Africa conceded gremlins were running amok with the upgrade of its billing systems, difficulties that have led to discrepancies with bills for its subscribers. Karel Pienaar, MD of MTN South Africa, said that his company was "hard at work" rectifying the problems and was proactively identifying customers who may have been affected. "MTN is following due process investigating the claims made by customers surrounding their voice and data usage. We have been in communications with ... |
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7
April 2010 |
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Neotel is in discussions with undersea cable consortium Seacom to have more capacity lit up on the cable soon. Angus Hay, Neotel's executive head of technology, says Africa's reaction to Seacom has been astounding, and the company has sold all the available capacity on the cable in under a year. "The growth has been spectacular," he notes. Neotel is now in discussions with the consortium to open up more capacity on the line; however, Hay will not indicate how much Neotel hopes to light up for fear of... |
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7
April 2010 |
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TELECOMS provider Neotel has called on the market to continue putting pressure on the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) to implement local loop unbundling (LLU), arguing that it is a key enabler to true competition in the market. LLU refers to the process of operators other than Telkom gaining access to Telkom's wires that link its exchanges to its customers' premises. "Let's not take the pressure off (the regulator to implement LLU). LLU will make a substantial difference to competition... |
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7
April 2010 |
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Neotel's roll-out of fibre has come far enough for it to now offer around 300 businesses access to what it calls "true broadband". Executive head of technology Angus Hay says the company's 4 000km roll-out of fibre now touches the doorsteps of around 300 businesses centres, and has already connected 150 of them to its fibre network. Neotel started the fibre rush in SA almost two years ago, sparking almost all local telecoms providers to begin digging trenches to fit their own cabling. Its links to Transnet... |
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31
March 2010 |
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From April 1 until the end of June, customers on iBurst wireless will get zero-rated bandwidth between the hours of midnight and 8am, according to a report on Daily Maverick. So what does this all mean? Any data transfer during this period will be free, not including the cap of contract customers with monthly data limitations or not being charged for those who pay by the megabyte. iBurst intends to make this a permanent part of its service, but it doesn't know what the take-up will be and whether its... |
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29
March 2010 |
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Cellular company MTN South Africa on Monday introduced new pricing for its mobile internet services, in a move likely to spark a price war. This follows the recent introduction of uncapped ADSL broadband internet connections by MWEB which has started a price battle for fixed-line access, with other service providers such as Vox Telecom and Afrihost following suit. The resultant consumer benefits were isolated to ADSL, however, excluding consumers that rely on mobile and wireless internet connectivity. MTN... |
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26
March 2010 |
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Cheap uncapped internet service providers (ISPs) are finally here, and there's never been a better time to get ADSL. With MWEB, Afrihost and Telkom all launching uncapped services, the benefits of the SEACOM undersea cable are starting to bear fruit. But it's not all roses and sunshine in South Africa's internet landscape. While our problem of bandwidth cost looks to have been well and truly solved thanks to the new ISPs, there is still one issue that needs to be attended to Telkom. The South African... |
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25
March 2010 |
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Afrihost, the broadband Internet service provider (ISP) that sparked South Africa's ADSL price war with its R29 per GB offer, has announced pricing for its first uncapped ADSL products. Users will be able to source uncapped ADSL from Afrihost from as little as R197 a month for a 384kbps line. For uncapped data on a 512kbps you'll pay R297 per month, and for uncapped data on a 4096 kbps line you'll pay R497 per month. Prices are for bandwidth only and exclude line rental costs through Telkom. "When we laun... |
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25
March 2010 |
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Telecommunications operator Neotel will launch its first prepaid services in the next four to six weeks as it attempts to lift its market share among retail consumers. The operator has fewer than 50 000 customers on its wireless network. "We are tying up the last set of operational issues ahead of launching prepaid services," says Neotel CEO Ajay Pandey. He declines to discuss tariffs, but says its prices "will be competitive". "The [prepaid] market is different and will look at value for money," he says... |
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25
March 2010 |
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MWeb aims to make amends to its ADSL terms and conditions by tomorrow, due to complaints from customers around capping. Carolyn Holgate, GM of MWeb Connect, says the company is in discussions with its legal team and hopefully final changes will be implemented by the end of the week. Customer complaints came to light after MWeb unveiled a range of competitively priced, uncapped ADSL offerings last week. "We are looking to make changes, but we don't see anything wrong with our terms and conditions, we stand... |
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19
March 2010 |
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Yesterday morning, after a lot of fanfare, MWEB announced their bravest business move since their Big Black Box: they are now offering uncapped ADSL for as little as R219 per month. "Uncapped" means exactly what it sounds like: unlimited usage with no annoying monthly data cap and no expensive top-ups just so you can download that vital e-mail on the 31st of the month. So what's the catch? A long contract, right? Nope - it's month to month all the way. Ok, so you need a special new kind of line or gadget?... |
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19
March 2010 |
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The company that in many respects started SA's broadband price war, Afrihost, says it will introduce low-cost and uncapped broadband packages from early next week. And its prices will, at the very least, match MWeb's. Afrihost's move comes just a day after MWeb, which is owned by media giant Naspers, took SA's Internet industry by surprise by slashing its broadband prices and introducing what are being seen as SA's first affordable uncapped broadband products. "We are absolutely, 100 percent going to react... |
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18
March 2010 |
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MWEB has thrown down the gauntlet to its competitors by announcing uncapped broadband packages for local users, in what looks set to change the internet landscape in South Africa. "We realised there's a major gap in the market. South Africa doesn't experience the internet like the rest of the world does. It's a fantastic opportunity to change the internet in SA," MWEB CEO Rudi Jansen told News24. Jansen added that the market still has a long way to go. "This is not the end. There are still probably three... |
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18
March 2010 |
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MWeb, part of media group Naspers, has thrown down the gauntlet to its rival in the Internet service provider market, slashing the price of fixed-line broadband, in same cases to as much as 40% below its rivals. The company will offer uncapped ADSL data starting at R219/month for a shaped, 384Kbit/s service; a shaped 4Mbit/s uncapped service will cost R539/month. In all, the company is introducing six data-only ADSL packages for consumers and businesses, it says, including options where Telkom broadband... |
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