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Internet providers WorldxChange and BayCity Communications are going to make a big push to get voice over internet protocol (VoIP) services out to rural areas using the Extend wireless network of state-owned broadcaster Kordia.
I had an unsettling feeling of deja vu when WorldxChange's Paul Clarkin explained this plan to me at the Telecommunications Users Association summit in Wellington last week.
After all, Kordia (then BCL) went out with a broadband service to farmers a few years ago and also planned to offer a wireless phone services that would finally allow farmers to cut their unreliable copper line to Telecom, once and for all. None of BCL's retail partners ended up offering the wireless phone service and the broadband access component has struggled to gain traction. Kordia boss Geoff Hunt says are only 2000 customers on the network but room for 20,000
Farmers, conservative spenders at the best of times, complained that the cost of the equipment was too great. So what's different this time? Rather than using the existing equipment's ability to offer a dedicated channel for voice calling, WorldxChange will deliver its VoIP service via the customer's broadband connection, just as a user in an urban area would receive it. That makes providing the phone aspect of the service less complicated and easier for WorldxChange to support.
I've tried the WorldxChange's VoIP service over my DSL connection and it is very good. It has great messaging functions and the call charges are competitive. Will it Work so well over wireless? That's still to be seen, but there are enough users out there on the wireless network currently just using broadband to do a widespread test of the voice service.
Clarkin says there have been dozens of people successfully using it for months as part of a trial. The problem is that new users are still faced with that big upfront cost ($800) of installing the equipment that connects their house or business wirelessly to the Kordia transmission tower.
That is still a significant barrier to uptake. But now that customers can actually ditch their $40 a month Telecom phone line the economics of the service work out better for everyone concerned.
What is interesting is that a handful of communications companies are ramping up their involvement in the rural sector, using wireless and satellite technology to reach customers. They obviously spot some profitable business there.
It's been said that without its monopoly on rural services, Telecom's real power base really starts to erode. Is this the beginning of that? Are farmers ready to take up VoIP?
