Cape Town - Moore’s Law, which has been used to describe how technology doubles up every year, is something that has not been applicable in South Africa according to IT experts.
While other countries reap the benefit of expanding networks and the resulting increase in internet speeds, South Africa has remained stagnant. But this is set to change.
Following the doubling of broadband speeds last year, ADSL lines will once again get the same treatment.
Telkom announced that over the next three months it would roll out line upgrades for its existing users.
“We are doubling the entry-level DSL speeds in the market,” said retail managing director Manelisa Mavuso.
The 1mbps (megabits per second) offering will be upgraded to 2mbps, while the current 2mbps line will become 4mbps and the current 4mbps line will run at speeds of up to 10mbps.
OpenWeb chief executive Keoma Wright said that while Telkom’s retail division had managed to drastically drop the price of their data bundles, OpenWeb could not do the same.
This boiled down to Telkom only marginally lowering the cost of their IPA, a licensing fee for third-party internet service providers (ISPs).
“Telkom’s IPC product is still extremely expensive making it very difficult for private ISP’s to compete with Telkom directly,” said Wright.
The line upgrades were set to be rolled out on November 11 and be completed by early next year. - Cape Argus