Kuala Lumpur, 2 February: Time dotCom, an optical fibre broadband service provider, launched Time Fibre Broadband in Mont Kiara, an exclusive, upmarket residential area of Kuala Lumpur  today.

The three packages are 2Mb/s, 5Mb/s and 10Mb/s unlimited access at RM149, RM199 and RM329 per month respectively. Each of these packages also includes up to 10 hours of free “Boost” speed of 10Mb/s per month, 50Mb/s free for up to 15 hours per month and 50Mb/s free for up to 30 hours per month respectively.

Users can turn on Boost speed as and when required, such as when downloading or streaming a large video file and  revert to their normal speed for regular Internet access. Additional Boost time at 50Mb/s costs RM10 for 2 hours, RM18 for 4 hours and RM35 for 8 hours.

The first phase of the rollout is currently available at seven exclusive, up-market condominia – namely, Mont Kiara Pines, Mont Kiara Palma, Mont Kiara Pelangi, Mont Kiara Sophia, Mont Kiara Astana, Mont Kiara Bayu and Mont Kiara Damai.

“We will extent coverage to other residences in Mont Kiara by the end of this first quarter and to the rest of the Klang Valley thereafter,” said Time dotCom chief executive officer, Afzal Abdul Rahim.

Most of these residences will be condominia, which can be more cost-effectively supplied with fibre connections with a faster return on investment, than to terraced houses and bungalows, which are more geographically spread out.

Time dotCom has mostly focused on providing communications connectivity and services to corporate and enterprise customers but recently came back into the consumer space and being cash rich, was able to finance its network rollout by itself.

Now why is it that Time dotCom choose to initially launch its service in and exclusive, up-market area such as Mont Kiara but not in low cost flats such as in Pantai Dalam, while in Singapore, residents in Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats in ordinary areas such as Tampines get broadband first, while residents in mansions in exclusive, upmarket neighbourhoods such Chestnut, Cashew and Dairy Farm off Upper Bukit Timah Road tend to get broadband last or must pay something like Sin$3,000 for a connection into their home?

“Let me be totally upfront. We are capitalists and want a return on our investment, and residents in low cost flats will not be able to pay,” Afzal replied.

Well, this writer knows a store young saleswoman and her young store salesman husband who live in a low cost flat in Pantai Dalam and have Streamyx but that's another story.

“We chose Mont Kiara for our initial rollout for its high density of affluent residents who can afford to pay a premium for quality Internet access to enjoy high bandwidth services such as streaming video and video downloads. For example, housewives in this neighbourhood would think nothing of spending RM500 a month on Japanese or Korean videos," he continued.

“On the other hand, average wage earners in Singapore can afford to pay the Sin$45/mo or so for high speed broadband but with the exchange rate as it is, broadband is expensive for Malaysians,” he added.

Well, Starhub told this writer at CommunicAsia about 10 years ago that the initial focus of its metropolitan fibre rings were the HDB flats and other such high-density residences.

Regarding the exchange rate, it was RM1.10 to the Singapore dollar during the prime ministerships of Tun Abdul Razak and Tun Hussein Onn but the ringgit began a gradual but steady depreciation against the Singapore since soon after Tun Dr. Mahathir became prime minister in mid-1981.

One of those owners of one of those exclusive, up-market mansions off Upper Bukit Timah Road who also was a top executive with an American multinational told this writer that the depreciation was planned by the Malaysian government to make Malaysia more price competitive in relation to Singapore, according to a Hong Kong based business publication, The Asia Letter, to which he subscribed at the time.

The targeted depreciation was RM1.60 to the Singapore dollar over a span of several years but the ringgit exchange rate literally went further down the drain following the Asian Economic Crisis of 1998.

Streaming video and downloads

One of the key targets of Time dotCom's service is high-definition streaming video and quality video downloads from sites such as the Apple iStore, which provides quality high-speed uploads at its end of demo video streams and downloads of purchased videos and 50Mb/s would enable a 5MB song to be downloaded in five seconds, a 100MB video clip to be downloaded in fibre minutes and a 152MB video clip to be posted (ie. uploaded) in two minutes.

However, broadband speed and quality is as good as its weakest link and just as it takes two to tango, download speeds as seen on the Malaysian end also depend on the upload speed from the server at the other end, as well as the performance of routers and switches at nodes along the way.

“While many Malaysians blame local operators for slow download speeds, they must realise that the speed also depends on what upload speed the content provider at the other end provides for each stream,” said Afzal.

“For example, a free video streaming portal such as You Tube knows of the slow broadband speeds in Malaysia and allocates enough upload bandwidth per stream, while also knowing that Singapore has good broadband, they provide higher upload capacity to Singapore. After all, it has to save money on bandwidth costs.

“However, Apple provides good upload speeds to provide visitors with a good experiences so that they will be encouraged to buy the content,” Afzal explained.

Well, using one of the Apple Mac Books provided with a 50Mb/s connection for the demonstration, this writer downloaded several You Tube videos via the download site http://keepvid.com and each download stream averaged about 1 Mb/s, while an about a half-gigabyte sized video file downloaded at around 500 Kb/s or about one-hundredth of the connection's maximum speed, which is not much faster than that of my 384Kb/s DiGi mobile broadband connection.

Another reason for Malaysia's poor broadband is that government's decision to let the private sector build their respective communications infrastructure but the problem here is that many private sector companies don't have the means to lay nationwide communications infrastructure quickly enough, so they have to start in in limited areas such as Mont Kiara and build out from there.

On the other hand, countries like Taiwan have a common trenching policy, where the government owns the communications ducts, the space in which it rents to various operators to draw their cables and fibre for the same fees, thus ensuring a level playing field, fair and equitable competition.

“There is common trenching in Cyberjaya but rental still costs too much,” said Afzal.

New thinking

Well after following he Thatcherite, Reaganite, Friedmanite, von Hayekist, Chicago School neo-liberal, free market, de-regulated policies on telecommunications networks and services, some countries have woken up and reverted to a mixed model of single  ownership and responsibility for certain parts of the infrastructure and competition by multiple parties over it on the other, much like public roads and highways are owned by the government, while the taxi, bus, lorry and other transport services are provided competitively over them.

Singapore has adopted a slightly different model, patterned upon new practices in some advanced countries, whereby a consortium headed by SingTel lays the fibre infrastructure, another consortium headed by Starhub operates it, while the network is open to multiple services providers to use to deliver their services competitively over it, while neither the Singtel nor Starhub consortia compete with them in services.

Malaysian company Jalenas, in which the Pahang State Government has a stake, also works in similar manner, where Jalenas owns the fibre infrastructure, Ericsson operates it and multiple third-parties provider services competitively over it.

Pain in the butt

“However, we can't go back now, and whatever, competition between infrastructures is part of the game for operators in Malaysia right now,” said Afzal.

“We could build out infrastructure faster but it's the local authorities such as the Kuala Lumpur City Hall, the Petaling Jaya City Council and others which are a pain in the butt by delaying in providing approval. They also require that we resurface all of the roads after we dig to lay ducts, and basically pay for what they should be paying for to do,” he added.

But is there enough space under the roads for operator's A, B, C, D, E, etc to lay their respective ducts, fibre or cables, as well as Tenanga Nasional to lay their electric cables and the the waterworks to lay their pipes?

“Our studies show that there is ample space under the roads,” said Afzal.

OK! But would it not be a terrible inconvenience for residents to have their roads dug up by operators A, B, C, D, E and others in succession, when it's bad enough already?

“Well, if they can't bear the inconvenience then they can't have broadband,” said Afzal.

Really! Without pointing a finger at Time dotCom, it's well know amongst residents how various contractors who lay communications ducts, cables and pipes under the road overnight, hastily fill up the trench and pave it over before the morning traffic, not only  leaving an unsightly scar on the road but which often breaks up shortly afterwards, leaving dangerous potholes or it becomes a rut in the road which can cause cars and motorcycles to go out of control and risk accidents.

Over 10 years ago, a contractor for one of the telecom operators (not Time dotCom), laid a duct under Jalan Dato' Abdul Jamil Rais (Jalan 14/15) in Section 14, Petaling Jaya where this writer lives, and the alphalt of the resurfaced part was a rut into which this writer's care often went into and risked going out of control.

My late gardener, when he was still alive that is, one rainy day rode his motorcycle into a pothole caused by a poorly resurfaced trench, crashed and ended up in hospital and fortunately for him he survived and recovered.

Just recently, another contractor has filled in the trench leaving an irregularity in the surface of Jalan 14/29 in Petaling Jaya.

So perhaps that's why the local authorities require telcos and utilities companies which dig up the road to pave the whole road over again and not just where they have dug.