Brunei to boost telco services By Lyna Mohammad

Minister of Communications, Pehin Dato Seri Setia Hj Awg Zakaria Datu Mahawangsa Hj Sulaiman (centre) witnesses the signing ceremony.

 
Exchanging the agreement documents.

The Minister of Communications, Pehin Dato Seri Setia Hj Awg Zakaria Datu Mahawangsa Hj Sulaiman, yesterday witnessed a signing ceremony between the Government of His Majesty the Sultan and Yang Di-Pertuan of Brunei Darussalam and the consortium of Huawei Technologies Investment Co. Ltd and KPF Comserve Sdn Bhd for the provision of next generation network for JTB on a full turnkey basis.

The signing ceremony was held at the Indera Kayangan Ballroom of the Empire Hotel & Country Club in Jerudong.

Signing on behalf of His Majesty's government was the Acting Director of Telecommunications, Dyg Hjh Norliha Hj Abu Bakar, witnessed by Hj Saharalidin Abdul Momin, Director of Corporate Telecoms Strategic Business Unit.

Chief Operating Officer, Dr Alexander Liu, meanwhile signed on behalf of Huawei technologies (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd and KPF Comserve was represented by its Managing Director, Mr Foo Chik Taing. Marketing Manager of Huawei Technologies (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd, Mr David Wang Chengdong and Operation and Business Director of KPF Comserve, were witnesses for their respective companies.

In attendance were Permanent Secretary of Ministry of Communications (MOC), Dato Paduka Hj Awg Abdullah Dato Paduka Hj Bakar and the Ambassador of People's Republic of China, Mr Wei Wei.

Chairman of TelBru Board of Directors, Dato Paduka Hj Othman Yaakub, Managing Director of TelBru, Awg Song Kin Koi and Managing Director of DST (B) Sdn Bhd, Pg Hj Mohd Zin Pg Damit, as well senior officers from MOC and Telecommunications and government departments were also among those who attended the event.

The contract will facilitate JTB (Jabatan Telekom Brunei) to meet current and future requirements of telecommunications systems through new telephone exchanges, transmission, Internet access and data communications in the sultanate.

This B$38.95 million project, which is expected to be completed by July 2004, are in line with the government undertaking through JTB in providing info-communications services to meet the social and economic developments especially on ICT, e-government, e-business and information gathering via internet.

Significant components of existing JTB's telephone exchanges are more than 16 years and already obsolete by the manufacturers resulting unavailability of spare parts. To replace these exchanges rather than continuously upgrading them is much more cost effective.

Trends of future info-communications move towards convergent IP services that requires high speed Internet access and IP based voice, data and video services and the demand of such services shall be met by Next generation Network (NGN), a major brand in the industry, with solutions provided by Huawei Technologies and KPF Comserve Sdn Bhd as the local partner.

Various types of equipment to provide various telecommunication services are currently required by JTB as maintenance and operation costs are high. With the implementation of NGN, there shall be a lot of commonly used network components providing various telecommunication services, translating to lower operation and maintenance costs, estimated to be up to 50%.

NGN will allow rationalisation of the present network of 3 major components. Telephone Network :2 exchanges as oppose to existing 17, telephony access equipment and Intelligent Network (IN) system, Data communication network that will also be used to provide broadband internet access service and transmission network based on IP over ATM that will use new equipment and existing RaGAM-21. With the commissioning of NGN, customers shall enjoy enhanced and new info-communication services which include universal numbering, televoting, click to dial, etc using IN platform, IP based multimedia services, IP based video conference, enhanced Broadband Internet Access, centrex, video streaming and virtual private network for government and corporate users.

Huawei U-SYS is a carrier-class NGN solution that consists of an extensive product portfolio such as Soft switch, Trunk Media Gateway, Universal Media Gateway, Signalling Gateway, Access Media Gateway, etc.

Operable and manageable, U-SYS features secure and reliable network structure with favourable compatibility, offering plenty of new value-added services as well as established PSTN services. The mass application of Huawei U-SYS in Brunei has further fostered Huawei's presence and credibility as a leading NGN gear maker in the worldwide telecom markets.