MyAdhan Blog

Link: UAE: du offers Freetime

All of du’s Pay as You Go and Monthly Plan customers, except business subscribers, can receive discounts of up to 60% on international calls via the ongoing Freetime promotion which ends on October 20. Customers will receive one fils of credit for every second they spend on an international call at any time and to any destination. Customers need to call 135 and select option 6 to activate the FreeTime offer.

Earlier this year MyAdhan first piloted a new scheme to allow TV charity appeal pledges to be collected via SMS at no cost to mobile phone users using our 80800 shortcode and DONATE keyword. We also reported on our that we had been working very closely with Channel S and more recently IslamChannel on this scheme.

We can now report that at the end of Ramadhan MyAdhan has helped raise over £2 million for UK Islamic charities, which is a phenominal achievement. One appeal alone generated over £160,000 worth of donations during the whole month.

MyAdhan hopes to continue to work with UK charities to help them use SMS text messaging as a way for donors to interact with charities.

Link: Rwanda Government Sells Telco to Libyan Based Investors

A Libyan company, Lap Green Networks has won the tender to buy 80% of Rwanda’s Rwandatel after agreeing to pay US$100 million and invest a minimum of US$87 million in the network within one year of completing the transaction. The government’s Social Security Fund will retain its 20% stake.

Lap Green Networks also owns a majority stake in Uganda Telecom (UTL) and says that it plans to launch a borderless roaming service between the two networks. This would be similar to the deal recently announced between Kenya’s Safaricom and MTN Rwanda which covers both Uganda and Kenya.

Link: Sudan to Host Meetings of African Regional Telecommunication Organisation

Khartoum is due to host on October 20 the 44th regular conference of the African Regional Communication Organization, with participation of 20 ministers and a number of experts. In a press statement, the Secretary General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and chairman of the higher committee for the conference, Abdul-Dafie Al-Khatib, said that all preparations were completed for holding the conference. He indicated that the meetings will begin at the technical level and then at the Level of the General Assembly. Al-Khatib said that the agenda of the meeting include the issue of launching an African satellite in next December, 2007. He said that Sudan will avail itself the conference opportunity to reflect the real current situation in Sudan and the conditions in Darfur, contribution of the African forces to peace-keeping in Darfur, besides acquainting with the economic development process in the country.

Link: Pakistan: ISPs see hard times ahead: PTCL launches new Internet service

Internet service providers (ISPs) would have another competitor in the market as Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) has launched its new service called ‘Phone n Net’. Whereas the local ISPs are taking it as a threat to their businesses, convener Internet Services Providers Association of Pakistan (ISPAK), Wahaj-us-Siraj told Daily Times on Thursday. PTCL, Pakistan’s largest Internet protocol (IP) network, has introduced its new product as ‘the most convenient landline Internet solution that converts your phone into a basic Internet connection’. This service is currently available on all landlines in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad and soon this service would be available in other cities of Pakistan.

Link: Iran: Telecommunication Company soon to be on the market

5 percent of the shares of the Iranian Telecommunication Company are going to be offered on the market in a month, said a reliable source in Telecommunication Company. He said that all the people have the opportunity of consuming the shares accounted for the cost. The cost of big companies is not specified so that it is going to be cost as soon as some shares of those companies are consumed. The execution of Constitutional Decree 44 is the objective of this step, which is a step forward extensive execution.

Link: SK Telecom eyes unnamed Pakistani telco

According to Dow Jones, SK Telecom has bid for a stake in an unidentified Pakistani telco. According to the report SK Telecom is now waiting for a reply from the company. Vice Chairman Jung Nam Cho was further quoted as saying: ‘We’re actively seeking business partnerships or to buy a stake in telecom companies in Asia, including India and Indonesia.’ In August this year SK Telecom acquired a 6.61% stake in China Unicom by converting almost USD1 billion worth of bonds in the Chinese company into an equity stake. The company also has a stake in a wireless operator in Vietnam, while in the US, it operates Helio, a financially redoubled MVNO, in partnership with EarthLink.

Link: Bangladesh opens international gateway

Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) has invited bids to operate international telecoms services by the private entities Sunday. It will issue licenses for two interconnection exchanges (ICX) and three licenses of International Gateway (IGW) facilities. The ICX will be linked with the IGW. The fixed and mobile operators’ outbound calls will first terminate in one of the six ICX. Then the calls will be processed in the IGW followed by getting routed to the overseas destinations via BTTB’s submarine cable station. Similar path will be followed for the inbound overseas calls.

Link: Bangladesh Gets Emergency Communications Gear

The United Nations telecommunications agency has deployed 30 satellite terminals in remote areas of Bangladesh as part of its efforts to restore vital communications links across the South Asian nation after devastating recent floods. The “plug and play” terminals, which are portable devices the size of a small suitcase, allow users to make calls to telephones, access the Internet and provide other voice, data and video services, such as telemedicine.

Link: Bangladesh: Bloggers protest internet user profiling

It all started when an exclusive report from E-Bangladesh exposed a memo of Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) which instructed 72 Internet Service Providers (ISP) of Bangladesh to submit their individual client details and their usage details. E-Bangladesh also revealed that raids have been carried out in innocent individual users’ houses, as a part of the ongoing illegal VOIP operators busting assignment.