[kictanet] [Fwd: [Fibre-for-africa] Q&A with SEACOM President]

[alice]

Hi all

FYI

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: 	[Fibre-for-africa] Q&A with SEACOM President
Date: 	Thu, 17 Jan 2008 11:39:47 +0100 (CET)
From: 	Wairagala Wakabi <wakabi at cipesa.org>
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<fibre-for-africa at lists.apc.org>
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<fibre-for-africa at lists.apc.org>
References: 	<478EEA7B.7040702 at apc.org> 
<FB0CFC3EE5CB18438CE7E5D638A91B8082084F at SFCMAIL01.safaricom.net> 
<2526.217.113.73.239.1200565276.squirrel at mail.cipesa.org>



Q&A with SEACOM President

Construction of the13,700 km Sea Cable System (SEACOM, www.seacom.mu) is
underway and expected to reach completion by June 2009. The cable will
comprise of two fibre pairs, connecting South Africa, Mozambique,
Madagascar, Tanzania, and Kenya to India and Egypt, with an option for
connectivity into the UAE and Djibouti.  Fibre-for-Africa
(www.fibreforafrica.net) spoke to SEACOM Ltd. president Brian Herlihy.
Excerpts:

Q. Who are the partners in SEACOM and how much are they investing in the
network?

A. SEACOM has publicly announced its investors, it is 75% African owned
with Agha Khan Economic Development Group (IPS) out of East Africa,
Venfin, Convergence Partners and Shanduka group from South Africa. The
remaining 25% is owned by Herakles Telecom, our New York based development
company. Herakles management is also the management of Sithe Global
(developer and investor of the Bujagali Hydro in Uganda) and Global
Alumina, a $4.5 billion alumina refinery in Guinea.

Q. What do you envisage will be the prices for SEACOM’s bandwidth?
A. SEACOM’s pricing is the equivalent of $100 to $170 per Mb/s per month.


Q. In what ways will SEACOM be competitive compared to other fibre
initiatives in the region, such as TEAMS and EASSy?

A. SEACOM is the only cable offering a PoP to PoP solution for Europe and
Asia. I believe this is a large advantage and the purchase of onward
capacity is a difficult process. SEACOM understands that TEAMS has very
competitive pricing to Fujairah. SEACOM believes that its pricing to
Europe is more competitive than EASSy’s pricing to Sudan.

Q. How will SEACOM assure affordability of services, and how has it been
responsive to NEPAD’s calls for Open Access?
A. SEACOM has structured each landing point as an open access unit. This
has been accomplished in two formats. First, the capital cost of the
landing stations is a sunk cost for SEACOM, in other words SEACOM does not
seek to recover the investment costs of the landing station through
co-location fees.

Secondly, each landing station is built with an additional building
whereby customers can put their own equipment at the cable station. SEACOM
has published its prices through many different forums. The pricing is an
80% discount over current satellite charges and is the only cable offering
capacity directly from a PoP (Point of Presence) in Nairobi to a PoP in
Europe or India without the requirement to purchase onward capacity.

Q. Would you say the fact that SEACOM is not a local company in the
countries where it is going to land fibre places it at a disadvantage
compared to pother cable systems such as EASSy and TEAMS?

A. Depending on each country’s regulatory regime, SEACOM has either
established a local entity to operate the cable or partnered with an
existing cable. SEACOM will bring experienced operators to the cable to
ensure that the local entities maintain world class quality service.

Q. What are your comments to the assertion that it is not viable for the
eastern coast of Africa to have three competing cables? Do you see a need
for the cables to cooperate in some areas rather than duplicate
everything?

A. The current capacity demand on the East Coast of Africa is very small.
However, we believe that the future demand will experience exponential
growth.  Having said the three competing systems would create a large
over-supply which could create a short term glut.

Q. What is Herakles Telecom and where does it operate from?
A. Herakles Telecom is a development company set in New York. The
management is the same management that works with Sithe Global
(www.sitheglobal.com) and Global Alumina (www.globalalumina.com)

Q. There has been talk that Herakles staff were involved in the Africa One
project which did not materialise, and that they collected money from
African telecom, which money has purportedly not been refunded. How true
is this, and how could it affect SEACOM’s operations?

A. I have noted the slander towards myself and JP (Jean Pierre de Leu) out
of Kenya.  I can confirm that both of us worked and spent many years with
Africa ONE for the hope that this project would go forward. However,
neither of us were principals of this project and left the project from
2002. It was our understanding that the only countries that made a deposit
were Eritrea and Mauritania.

We understand that the sales person for Eritrea was able to help that
money be returned.  It should be noted that the Africa ONE name was sold
by AT&T to a private investment group in 1998 and it was this group who
was responsible for that money ¬ JP and myself have nothing to do with
this entity.  Since Africa (2002) I have worked as a developer on over $5
billion of projects in Africa, each of which have excellent reputations
and large impacts in their respective countries, including Bujagali in
Uganda. - wakabi at cipesa.org

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