Thaicom clinches right to retain second orbital slot
The Information and Communications Technology Ministry can now preserve the country's right to use the 50.5 degrees east longitude orbital slot, which had been due to expire in November, after Thaicom informed it that it had made plans for an interim sat
In the next step, Thaicom will have to ask for a licence from the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) to operate the interim satellite, ICT Minister Anudith Nakornthap said yesterday after being briefed by Thaicom.
A ministry source said the interim satellite would be parked at the 50.5 degrees slot next week. The device belongs to a European operator whose satellites orbit in adjacent slots.
Thaicom was assigned by the ICT Ministry in the previous government to help preserve the country’s legal right to use two slots, 120 degrees east and 50.5 degrees east. Thaicom and Asia Satellite Telecommunication (AsiaSat) have already jointly positioned an interim satellite to retain the 120 degrees slot, so the next task was to retain rights to the other slot.
Anudith also announced the ministry’s one-year performance report yesterday, of which one accomplishment is its further expansion of broadband Internet accessibility in remote areas. The ministry has targeted this expansion to cover 80 per cent of the populations by 2015 and 95 per cent by 2020.
He added that basic telecom infrastructure now covered 87 per cent of the populations.
The ministry aims to install free Wi-Fi service in 250,000 spots nationwide in the future, up from the target this year of 30,000, of which 10,567 are in place. It kicked off the project last year as part of the government’s policy to promote equal Internet broadband access among Thais wherever they live. Currently the service has 279,128 users.
Anudith said his ministry also achieved the government’s task of procuring tablet computers for Prathom 1 students under the One Tablet Per Child project. In July the ministry signed an order for the second lot of tablets with the Chinese firm Shenzhen Scope Scientific Development. This order is for 403,941 units at US$82 each or a total of Bt1.05 billion as part of the total order for 804,941 of the devices.
It signed the order for the first lot of 400,000 units with Shenzhen Scope in May. The Chinese supplier is expected to finish delivering all of the units in September.
On the attempt by TOT and CAT Telecom to keep their spectra after their cellular concessions end, Anudith said he had assigned a joint committee of the ICT Ministry and the NBTC to handle the task.
The joint committee will be mandated to solve 10 key issues, including whether the two state telecom agencies can hang on to their spectra after the concessions expire.
CAT’s cellular concessions granted to TrueMove and Digital Phone Co both end in September next year, followed by the Advanced Info Service concession granted by TOT, which expires in 2015. CAT’s concession granted to Total Access Communication (DTAC) is the last to expire, in 2018. Both state agencies want to maintain these spectra to generate new revenue sources.
Under the NBTC’s spectrum management master plan, all state agencies have to hand over their spectra for NBTC reallocation once the private concessions end.
