Community Based Telco

Voice based communication is of particular interest in many rural communities as well as some urban communities where read and write culture is not widely spread. In addition having a 24 hours Internet connection in most modern offices would likely be a significant incentive to be able to interconnect their PBX in offices for long distance as well as local calls over their existing 24 hours Internet connection.

In this chapter, I would argue that cost-wise a community based infrastructure rely on WiFi, VoIP and PBX would have a much less investment and operating costs as compared to conventional cellular or public switch telephony network infrastructure. Thus, it would be of interest to look at such alternative infrastructure in developing countries.

The cost reference here is the typical cost in Indonesia, a developing nation, in the Asia Pacific. In developed nations, the cost might be much lower. However, in some African countries, the cost might be higher. Not to mention some regulatory complexity.

An typical Internet Telephony Gateway (ITG) with four (4) ports would cost about US$400 each. The ITG will translate conventional voice traffic into VoIP traffic over Internet infrastructure.

To reduce the investment and operating cost, we normally connect the ITG to a Private Branch Exchange (PBX) and share the VoIP lines with more people in the office or neighbors.  Thus, it is normal to connect all four (4) ITG’s port to PBX. A typical PBX, such as, Panasonic KX-TA616 has 6 CO lines and 16 extensions. Panasonic KX-TA616 may cost around US$400-500.

A ready to use client side WiFi equipment would cost about US$150-200. An RJ-45 UTP connector is ready to use on the back for this equipment to be connected to other network equipment on our local network. To extend the distance, a US$50-100 external antenna may be added. Such configuration may reach 5-8 km distances, a good enough distance in most medium size cities in developing countries. For those who like to build your own PC based client WiFi equipment may get a much-reduced WiFi investment.

Total investment cost is about a maximum of US$1200 for WiFi equipment, Internet Telephony Gateway and PBX. The 16 subscribers connected through the extension of the PABX must pay these investment costs. Thus, investment cost per subscriber is about US$75.

A typical cellular investment / subscriber is about US$300-400/subscriber. While, a typical fixed wire telephony network / public switch telephone network requires about US$1000/subscriber. Thus, WiFi & VoIP based infrastructure per line is much less as compared to typical investment per subscriber in cellular and in typical public switch telephone network.

Based on the IP bandwidth calculation http://www.erlang.com, a typical full duplex G.723.1 (ACELP) 5.3Kbps compressed voice including the TCP/IP protocol header will require about 64Kbps for a four (4) lines VoIP.

A dedicated 64Kbps Internet link would normally sell at US$350-400 /month directly from the Internet Service Provider (ISP). A no cost 24-hour local connection to the ISP can be done using WiFi equipment replacing the local Telco’s leased line.

Thus, the actual monthly operating cost per subscriber of such community based infrastructure is only US$350-400/16 or about US$20-25/month/subscriber including “unlimited” long distance calls over the Internet to other community based network.

If US$20-25/month/subscriber seems too high, one can always resell their access to others in their communities as demonstrated by the Women in Bangladesh who subscribe to Grameen Phone.

Both low investment cost and low operating cost has been demonstrated in a simple community based infrastructure based on WiFi, VoIP and PBX. Hope to see such infrastructure can be flourishing in many countries in years to come.

From regulatory point of view, the main catch in deploying such infrastructure would be in interconnection between these community based VoIP infrastructure and the existing incumbent Telco’s infrastructure. VoIP would normally blamed for reducing Telco’s long distance revenue. As no cost involved in community infrastructure interconnection, it would be difficult to interconnect such infrastructure to commercial incumbent Telco infrastructure.

As more mature cellular industry, with much more feature, tariff incentive as well as number of subscriber, it would be of interest to look at cell infrastructure. In Indonesia case, as competition goes, some cellular operators initiate a free roaming policy. Thus, long distance revenue is no longer a big issue. It would be of interest to see cellular infrastructure as the middleman between these communities based VoIP infrastructure and incumbent Telco’s infrastructure as long as no power exercised by the Incumbent.
 
Low cost with user-friendly interface characterized modern ICT gears. Such ICT equipments enable small- and medium-sized enterprises even community to build their own interconnected network. It leads to bottom-up, community-based ICT/telecommunication infrastructure that from the people; by the people; and for the people. Such infrastructure may challenge the regulatory framework in some countries.

A community based ICT infrastructure has nothing to do with the technological superiority of the equipment. It relies heavily on community education process to sustain its self-finance deployment. Ability to generate and efficiently distribute local knowledge in local language would be the most strategic key.