Pakistan’s Wateen Telecom will deliver voice and data signals in remote mountainous areas in the north and inaccessible southern regions of the country via SES Networks’s connectivity, according to a press release by SES Networks.
SES announced that the agreement will provide Wateen with access to high-powered C-band capacity on SES’s NSS-12 satellite at the orbital location of 57 degrees East. The satellite capacity, coupled with Wateen’s system integration capabilities, will provide cellular backhaul service to Pakistan’s leading mobile network operators. Wateen Telecom will support both 2G and 3G backhaul service on this network.
Rizwan Tiwana, CEO at Wateen Telecom, stated, “This marks the beginning of an exciting new partnership with SES Networks, and a continuation of our commitment to offer the best service quality to our customers.”
Imran Malik, Vice President, Fixed Data, Asia-Pacific at SES Networks said, “We are pleased that Wateen Telecom recognises the benefits of SES Networks’ seamless network and other capabilities, tapping into our high-powered satellite to bring reliable and high-quality cellular backhaul services to mobile network operators. We look forward to building a strong strategic partnership with Wateen Telecom and being a consistent source of support and empowerment as they address their consumers’ changing connectivity needs.”
French Polynesia & Solomon Islands
SES Networks’s press releases also detailed its deals in the Pacific territories.
The Office des Postes et Telecommunications of French Polynesia (OPT) is delivering enhanced mobile broadband and Internet services to residents across the vast French Polynesian territory through a new partnership with SES Networks.
Under the new agreement, OPT will access NSS-9 satellite’s wide C-band coverage to reach the sprawling Polynesian archipelago of 118 islands in the South Pacific and beyond. Connectivity on NSS-9 will enable OPT and its fully-owned subsidiary, VINI, to grow their network to meet connectivity needs. OPT has been using SES satellite capacity to provide connectivity services since 2007.
In the neighbouring Solomon Islands, Solomon Telekom Company Limited (Our Telekom) is expanding its partnership with SES Networks to enable faster and improved mobile and internet services to communities scattered throughout more than 900 islands within the Solomon Islands archipelago.
Under the agreement announced by SES, Our Telekom has contracted capacity on SES’ Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO) fleet to enhance connectivity between remote provinces and the nation’s capital, Honiara. This comes in response to rapidly increasing data consumption by residents and enterprise customers across the isles, especially in the archipelago’s outermost stretches.
The reliability of GEO connectivity complements “fibre-like internet speeds” already being provided through Our Telekom’s existing partnership with SES Networks. Last November, the telco launched its first 4G/LTE network in Solomon Islands powered by the O3b Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) constellation, and has upgraded bandwidth every four months since.
