Korean ADSL.....
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Telecom Companies Flock to ADSL for Higher
Internet Traffic
The explosive growth of integrated services digital network (ISDN) in Korea
may come to a halt. According to industry analysts and the Ministry of
Information and Communication, the local telephone service providers such as
Korea Telecom Corp and Hanaro Telecom, Inc have stopped additional
investment on ISDN and are moving to concentrate on asymmetric digital
subscriber line (ADSL) to cater to higher Internet user traffic. ADSL is
capable of operating at speeds of up to 6Mbps downstream, compared with
144kbps of ISDN.
"We will expand ADSL from 2000 lines to 90,000 lines by February this year,
and 1 million lines by the end of the year. That's our basic plan. We will stop
additional investment on ISDN, which we had concentrated on last year, and it
will be a product targeting a niche market," said the department chief, Planning
and Coordination, Korea Telecom. Hanaro Telecom have already stopped
new investment on ISDN and converted to ADSL, and are attracting the
subscribers of ISDN to ADSL. The company will continue to lead subscribers
to ADSL and establish more than 200,000 ADSL lines this year.
"A large scale investment is expected when UADSL(universal ADSL) that has
2 Mbits/s of transmission speed is commercialized in April or May," said
Jaehong Lee, general manager of the Ministry of Information and
Communication. "So, we might have to remap the future of the domestic
information and communication industry then," he added.
Meanwhile, Daewoo Telecom Co, Ltd has attracted attention as it has started
to concentrate on ADSL-related equipment business. Daewoo Telecom and
Alcatel have agreed to establish an ADSL equipment production line which
can provide 1 million lines annually in Korea. Alcatel will offer technique and
manpower support. To improve pricing, the two companies decided to
increase the ratio of localization for parts of Daewoo Telecom from 30% to
80% during the first quarter. "Daewoo Telecom had a good opportunity to
secure leading technology from Alcatel through the contract. We will continue
to cooperate to enable penetration into the overseas market following the
domestic market," said Jinchan Kim, vice president of Daewoo Telecom. |
