TSTT trying to stall competitor

THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS war in this country intensified yesterday, with incoming mobile service provider Digicel accusing Cable and Wireless (C&W), a major shareholder in  TSTT, of “trying to stall the liberalisation and inter-connection process across the region.” In a strongly worded media statement yesterday, Digicel’s incoming CEO, Stephen Brewer, said the company had been “repeatedly frustrated in our attempts at inter-connecting with other carriers in the region belonging to Cable and Wireless.” To back up this claim, the company attached to its statement a December 2002 story in London’s Financial Times which detailed contents of a 59-page C&W report into how it was positioned against its emerging rival Digicel.

According to the Financial Times, the internal report, which had been leaked to the newspaper, stated that C&W had several weaknesses in the face of the competitive threat from Digicel, including being too slow in planning for competitive environments; a failure to be innovative with new products and services; expensive handsets; inconsistent performance and quality of service; restrictions on hiring, insecurity, low morale, rising levels of sick days and organisational uncertainties. The story continued: “Under recommendations, the report outlines ways C&W could block Digicel’s advance in the region — although these could be highly controversial. As the incumbent operator, C&W is having to open its networks to competitors as the market is deregulated.” The report suggests that “Digicel should be forced to use the point of inter-connection chosen by C&W and not what is convenient to them.”

The report says C&W should “refuse” to give Digicel the use of some exchanges on the grounds that they are “over-crowded.” It concedes that the regulator will eventually force the company to comply. However, it suggests that C&W can stipulate that only C&W staff are employed to install the infrastructure. In response to TSTT’s claim that Digicel, was “abandoning sound technical expertise,” Brewer accused the incumbent telecommunications provider of “hiding behind a smokescreen of so-called technological problems in the hope that this will confuse the public on what is really a clear-cut issue.” “The Telecommunications Authority of Trinidad and Tobago (TATT), who are the guardians of the people of Trinidad and Tobago in the telecommunications sector, does not buy their excuses. If they say it is possible to have Digicel in the market by November 30, 2005 and Digicel says ‘we are ready,’ then it’s for the public to make up their own minds who is telling the truth here and who is being disingenuous,” the company statement continued.

The company said it was an absurdity to suggest that it was behaving in a short-sighted and reckless manner and added that it has documentation to prove that required traffic projections were sent to TSTT on June 24. “All the required traffic projections are in accordance with international protocol. In September, with no reference to the issue in the intervening period, TSTT said they needed further information that was wholly unnecessary for the inter-connection process. Nevertheless, Digicel provided TSTT with the additional information to leave them with no excuses whatsoever to delay the process further.”

The Digicel statement continued: “TSTT’s suggestion that inter-connecting to Digicel would cause congestion on its network is a fallacy that could only be based on an assumption that TSTT would not lose a single customer to Digicel. The reality is that as people begin to join the Digicel network this will relieve much of the congestion that currently exists on the TSTT network.” Digicel further claimed that TSTT had refused to order inter-connect equipment and had first argued that they would not bear the risk of these costs given that Digicel was not a concessionaire. “Over the past months Digicel has continually offered to pay for all TSTT’s inter-connect equipment to take that risk away from them until such time as we were in receipt of the concession.” TSTT officials could not be reached yesterday for a response to Digicel’s statement.