RE: Mobile network costs -- was -- MW4D & Accessibility

In India, the government stipulates roll-out conditions while granting
license for an operator to deploy a mobile network. This typically requires
the operator to cover X% of urban area and Y% of rural area within N years
from the grant of licence. However, in practice, enforcement of these
roll-out conditions has been rather lax so far.

Regards,
-nadeem

-----Original Message-----
From: public-mw4d-request@w3.org [mailto:public-mw4d-request@w3.org] On
Behalf Of Lauri.K.Hirvonen@nokia.com
Sent: Monday, August 10, 2009 2:59 PM
To: boyera@w3.org; yoshiko.kurisaki@icvolunteers.org
Cc: jbrewer@w3.org; public-mw4d@w3.org
Subject: Mobile network costs -- was -- MW4D & Accessibility
Importance: High

Hello team

I like to comment the cost (of operation of
the mobile network).

In less populated areas, it is very expensive 
to build mobile networks.

In cities, big cities, it is much cheaper.
(= more users to share the cost of
building and operating mobile network.)

This is also true in more developed countries
like Finland. It is always the highest populated
areas, that are built first. The less populated
areas are the last one to be built. 

The government of Finland has mandated the
mobile phone operator to offer services also
to less populated areas. Operator do it by
increasing the charges to everyone which
allows them to built mobile coverage to
less populated areas, where the pay-back
by it's use is low. So populated cities
are covering also the cost of running
rural areas.

This allows that the voice call tariffs are
the same in big cities and in rural areas.

I have heard, that in some "developing countries"
the first operator to build a mobile network
do make a contract with country government.

Typically those contracts gives them "monopoly"
for certain period. That means, that the government
will not give license to an other mobile network
operator. So no competition. 

But also government want their share. In many
countries the mobile phone is listed in luxury 
item category and the taxation is high. They 
charge import custom tax for the product and 
it can be very high. (So end user has to pay
higher price.) Also the mobile operator's
center equipment can have this high import
tax. It makes it for operator more 
expensive to pay back, this means again
higher prices to users.

This is often the situation to have the first
mobile network in the country. Later when the
"first operator is profitable and managed 
to cover most of the building costs" the country
can allow new mobile operators to enter
the country mobile market. This then
increases competition and usually lower
the price for use of mobile phone.

It would be nice if organization like "World Bank"
could offer loan for operator to built
mobile network. The loan could be negotiated
to cover longer period (to pay it back). This
means, operator can offer the mobile service
to users with lower prices.

Br. Lauri

>-----Original Message-----
>From: public-mw4d-request@w3.org 
>[mailto:public-mw4d-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of ext Stephane Boyera
>Sent: 06 August, 2009 13:10
>To: Yoshiko Kurisaki
>Cc: Judy Brewer; public-mw4d@w3.org
>Subject: Re: MW4D & Accessibility
>
>Dear Yoshiko,
>
>thanks for your support.
>
>> Allow me to propose another point of accessibility, Network 
>> accessibility
>
>This is indeed a very important point. This is not really 
>accessibility in the sense it is described in the 6.1.1 
>section, but the cost, due to monopoly is clearly an issue; 
>This will be covered in section 6.1.5 around costs
>
>best
>Stephane
>
>-- 
>Stephane Boyera		stephane@w3.org
>W3C				+33 (0) 5 61 86 13 08
>BP 93				fax: +33 (0) 4 92 38 78 22
>F-06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex,		
>France
>
>
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Received on Monday, 10 August 2009 09:53:32 UTC