Telco exec touts Broadband "up to five Megahertz"

THE CEO of local loop monopoly Telecom Argentina made a surprising statement at the Triple Play 2007 conference: the firm is offering broadband "up to five megahertz".

Carlos Felices, Telecom Argentina's CEO said: "We have worked, we are working on broadband up to five megahertz. We firmly believe in competition and equal opportunities that should exist so this competition includes the different operators". It's hardly a surprise that an executive cannot discern between megabits and megahertz -after all Scott Adams made a complete business out of laughing at the corporate suits with Dilbert. Still, he didn't correct himself, and nobody around him seemed to notice it. So there you have: broadband at five Megahertz. That should be an interesting proposition... broadband near the AM radio band. Maybe it's a secret WiMAX killer?.

Telecom Argentina's CEO, Carlos Felices

Exchanging roses
The execs of Telecom Argentina and Telefonica publicly exchanged roses, and "agreed to agree" on everything, congratulating each other on the mutual convergence of their ideas. They even dared to speak about a new era of openness, competition and about "sharing networks". Real, tangible product announcements: none. IPTV and "Triple-play" from the incumbents will be a reality sometime in "late 2007, early 2008", they promise.

The only statements: first, they are patiently -quietly and without hurry, apparently- awaiting the regulatory framework to get into IPTV, and second, they were monitoring implementations of the triple-play technology at the "mothership" countries which control each company -Spain in the case of Telefonica, and Italy in the case of Telecom Argentina-.

The incumbents' idea of "network sharing" surely means sharing between the two incumbents, as Telecom serves the Northern halve of the country and Telefonica the Southern one. The question of "local loop unbundling", the regulation signed by decree seven years ago -but never put into effect- and which would give consumers true freedom and choice, was still the "elephant in the room" during the incumbents execs' speech. Carlos Felices also described Telecom Argentina as a "flexible" and "agile" corporation. Strangely, nobody laughed.

Complete audio bits of the statement -Spanish language- can be found here.µ

L'INQs
Australia's 5 Mhz time radio broadcast service

See also:
Latin American Triple-play conference grows, challenges Expocomm
IPTV not a priority for cable operators
Mexican Billionaire nabs WiMAX operation in Argentina
Intel creates new software R&D unit in Argentina