FTTH? LOL? HSBB HSBT High Speed Broadband in Malaysia: Triple Play

• Posted by: adrian
• On: 09/09/2008 05:50:22
• In: Data: 3G, GPRS, EDGE, WLAN, Bluetooth

Fiber to the Home (FTTH) has been slated by broadband providers as the best choice of connectivity to spur broadband in any area/country. Though, cost can go up to RM10,000 per customer, it's gonna be a long term (10 years at least) investment.

Triple Play is nearing our shores. That word has been synonymous to cable operators in the United States for decades and its finally arriving at our doorsteps, literally. After years of waiting, we can now finally start to enjoy IPTV, VOIP and High-Speed Internet!

This is not the high-speed internet we currently have that "tries" to make it to 4Mbps, where most areas already have 1Mbps. It's the 10Mbps dedicated or 1Gbps dedicated which we're talking about that is covered wayyy to the last mile!

Imagine being about to watch TV whenever you want, make calls for almost free and download Google's Chrome in less than 2 seconds? Where the 1 second delay was due to the fact that you were indecisive of where to save the setup file!

We, as consumer can only hope that the RM2.3 billion Ringgit that the government is freely giving away to TM's stakeholders are put to good use. As it makes no sense for TM to spend all their own RM8.9 billion on equipment and use the "rakyat's" money on OPEX and content.

I do salute HSBT's initiative and sincerely think that Shukor, their Corp Strategies guy has a right frame of mind to push for their own private initiative and licensing. It would be exciting times ahead to see a government state like Pahang give TM a run for its money. His team has a lot of foresight and judging from their standpoint, I think broadband will definitely only be an "enabler". It is also fun to watch how their profit sharing model with content operators will fare. I know of no other successful business case content model other than the I-Mode of Japan, where they only take 5% from content operators.

On the other hand, Jaring has taken a "how to get it done" and "what needs to be done" stand. Hence, it would be funny to see when they too go head to head with HSBB and HSBT. They were here at the hey-days of dial-up. And they have not been around since. To say that 10 years was lost since the inception of the MSC and granting TM the sole infrastructure provider for the MSC is factual, but we all know that "enablers" are movers and shakers of the industry, not "crying over spilled milk". Nevertheless, the noble truth of making Malaysian High-Speed Backbone holds the truth that, "YES", we actually need an independent infrastructure provider. But, who on earth would wanna do it without any profits or concession.

More interesting months to come when TM signs with HSBB these fews days. 

To top it all off, we all know that content are the drivers of broadband. Without content (at least with Astro signed up with all the major media houses & brands), I think we are left with a natural death (MiTV without content) unless we generate content locally. Hence, like my mantra, content will always be king!