Nishantha Palihawadana Telecommunications Regulatory Commission of

Sri Lanka

Content Country Profile Technological Development of Broadband Stagers of Competition Regulatory Intervention Price Regulation QOS Regulations National Broadband Policy National Broadband Networks Future Direction

Country Profile

Area 65,610 sq km

Population (March, 2012) 20,277,597

GDP 59.2 US $ Billion)

GDP per Capita 2,836 US$

Fixed Line 3,449,391

Cellular Mobile 20,324,070

Tele-density Fixed Service 17

Tele-density Mobile Service 100

Broadband Internet Subscribers 1.1 Million

Technological Development of Broadband Fixed Broadband Broadband was introduced by the incumbent operator

Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT) in 2003 Dialog Broadband Networks entered to the Market in

2007 using wireless technology based on Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) (IEEE 802.16d)

In 2012 they have started providing Broadband services using LTE.

Lanka Bell introduces broadband internet using WiMAX (IEEE 802.16d)

Mobile Broadband Dialog Mobile Introduced 3G Broadband services in

2006. Mobitel also introduced 3G Broadband services in

2006. Airtel is the new entrant to Mobile market with 3G

services in 2009. Etisalat introduced 3G Broadband services in 2011. Hutchison the last operator to introduced 3G

Broadband services in 2012.

Stages of Competition Monopoly Stage From 2003 to 2007 there was no competitor to the

incumbent operator, Sri Lanka Telecom The prices were high Less Quality

Introduce Competition The two operators Lankabell and Dialog entered to

the Market to provide the Broadband Internet using WiMAX (IEEE 802.16d) They were unable to give proper competition due to

high cost at the initial stage

Introduction of Mobile Broadband In 2007 Dialog Mobile and Mobitel introduced mobile

Broadband through 3G HSPA Strong competition price per GB to come down drastically higher data transfer speeds. The initial cost spent on HSPA is substantially lower

Regulatory Intervention Identify the Challenges

Price Regulation Quality of Service National Broadband Policy Increase Penetration Develop Infrastructure

Price Regulation Reduce the incumbent’s submarine cable landing

station charges by 50% in 2010

Price Regulation Until 2010 mobile broadband prices were high. Compaction was promoted resulting price reduction Current Mobile Broadband Prices

Peak offpeak 2.4 US$ 2 GB 3 GB 3.5 US$ 2 GB 5 GB 2 US $ 2GB 2.8 US$ 3GB 5 GB

Mobile BB Price Reduction

Mobile BB Subscriber Growth

2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012Fixed 54,238 97,957 161,074 233,541 297,791 365,100Mobile 209,946 485,165 746,945

-

100,000

200,000

300,000

400,000

500,000

600,000

700,000

800,000

Subs

crib

ers

Fixed & Mobile Broad Band Growth : 2007- 2012

Strategies Adopted to Price Reduction of Fixed Broadband

In 2010, reducing prices of competitor lead to reduce price of the incumbent

1Mbps

• 10 GB price drop up to 12 US $ of the competitor

• 8 GB price drop up to 12 US $ of the incumbent

Strategies Adopted to Price Reduction of Fixed Broadband In 2011, again incumbent was forced to reduce prices

by reducing the prices of the competitor

1Mbps

• 10 GB price drop up to 4 US $ of the competitor

• 25 GB price drop up to 12 US $ of the incumbent

In 2012 January incumbent operator has introduced high speed high volume tariff plans 16 Mbps 120 GB

8 Mbps 60 GB

4 Mbps 75 GB

Fixed Broadband Price Reduction

SLT

LB SLT

LB

SLT

LB SLT

LB

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

2011 2012 2011 2012

1 Mbps 2Mbps

US$

per

1 G

B

Where are we today? ITU publication- Measuring Information Soceity -2012

Quality of Service Definition Technology neutral high speed data communication

service with a broader bandwidth capacity not less than 1Mbps downlink, which enables the operation of wide array of applications and services online.

Broadband Subscriber An internet customer who consumes grater than

100MB within a period of 30 consecutive days and using an access service with the speed equal or grater than 1Mbps to access the Internet will be regarded as a Broadband Subscriber.

Broadband Benchmarking Process Broadband benchmarking process started in 2010. (Recruited a consultant ) The Regulator measures the quality and published in TRC

official website. Initially it was measured for the Fixed Broadband Services

and subsequently for the mobile Broadband Services. The measurements were taken from dense populated areas

and allow operators to upgrade their quality and in the process of measuring suburbs.

Operators started to compete for higher speeds

QOS Improvement Fixed Broadband

Speed Test Facility Download Speed : Fixed Broadband: The average download data transfer speed (Single TCP secession to an

International domain) of the service at any given time, within a period of 24hours should be maintained at or above 70% from the advertised bandwidth.

Mobile Broadband Within a period of 24 hrs, the average download speed of the service

between any two time slots of 60 minutes time interval should be maintained (Single TCP session to a server or servers designated by the TRCSL and with RSSI value better than -90dBm) on or above 30% from the advertised/provisioned bandwidth.

Speed Reference: International Domain Methodology : Single TCP/IP Method

Removing Unlimited Data Plans

Service providers offered packages with the “unlimited” marketing tagline to attract customers, but they in fact provided very low speeds of data transfer.

QoS improvements have influenced operators to adopt traffic policies and introduce new packages to the market with pre-allocated data volumes to manage their network resources, instead of continuing with so-called ‘unlimited’ packages capable of downloading any amount of data

National Broadband Policy National Priority will be Given to Broadband Deployment Potential Spectrum will be released to operators Incentives/Subsidies/ Tax concessions Red Tape will be removed

National Broadband Network Domestic Fiber Networks will be made available to Mobile Broadband Operators to Backhaul Gigabit Traffic - NBN National Broadband Network Advantages of Migration from Microwave to Fiber QoS Improvements (Backhaul /End User) Cost Effectiveness Scalability

Future Direction Increase more competition in the

international connectivity Facilitate to develop more local contents Increase Island wide mobile Broadband

coverage Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network

Thank You Ayubowan