Who needs NTT?
WEB-SURFERS in Japan could soon pay little more than Americans and Europeans for using the Internet, instead of up to five times as much, as they do now. The stranglehold that Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) has had over Japan's domestic telephone tariffs is being prised loose by newcomers who have found ways to avoid the giant firm's network. Until now, e-commerce in Japan has been smothered by the country's high telephone charges. But not, perhaps, for much longer.
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[But] NTT's biggest local rivals will be Japanese utilities. Between them, Japan's ten regional electricity suppliers own the second-largest fibre-optic network in the country, measuring 160,000 kilometres and growing. The largest utility, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), recently joined forces with Microsoft and Softbank, a Japanese software and media conglomerate, to offer unmetered Internet access. The new venture, called SpeedNet, is to be online before next summer and will probably charge a flat fee of less than ¾4,000 a month. Other utilities are also planning soon to roll out similar services in the rest of Japan.
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With so many new telecoms firms, NTT is going to have to rethink its age-old strategy of loading all its sunk costs on every new service it offers. The arrival of fresh competitors could also lead it to accelerate the introduction of optical fibre to the home-it is currently due only in 2010.
Long before then, Japanese surfers will have found other ways of gaining broadband access to the Internet. And once they do, they will use their permanent Internet connections not only to shop, and receive their television and video programmes, but also to make all their telephone calls.
economist.com |
