A team is currently conducting a feasibility study on the possibility of launching this service in Nepal, Lok Raj Sharma, head of NT´s IT department, told Republica. "We will get a comprehensive report within two months and decide on whether to float a public tender notice and invite interested parties to submit bid documents, or to roll out the next-generation network by ourselves," he said.
The wireles broadband technology 4G, which provides peak internet speeds of 160Mbps, was recently unveiled for the first time, in Sweden, by Ericsson and TeliaSonera. It is expected to be commercially launched in that country next year.
Although TeliaSonera has an 80 percent stake in Spice Nepal Private Limited (SNPL), Chandi Shrestha, director of SNPL, has said that the company does not have any plans of launching this service now in Nepal. "Our only focus at this moment is on expansion and increasing the country´s teledensity, not on introducing new services," he said.
If NT launches the cutting-edge 4G technology, the company--the first to introduce 3G services in South Asia--will further consolidate its position as the frontrunner in introducing the latest wireless internet technologies in Nepal.
NT was the first telecom company to introduce wireless internet services that operated on the PDSN (Packet Date Serving Node) technology. This service can be accessed using 1x USB modems or PCMCIA cards and offers a peak speed of 256Kbps. NT is also launching another wireless internet service, called EVDO (Evolution, Data Optimized), for the first time in the country very soon; the EVDO offers a top speed of 2Mbps.
"But 4G is a different ball game altogether" said Sharma. "Due to its high-speed connectivity and its wireless nature, this service will give a completely different broadband experience, especially to users who are on the move."
With this service, users can watch television over the internet, video blog, play online video games, use mobile office applications and download an entire movie in less than five minutes, without encountering any problems. In other words, seamlessness will be the most important characteristics of the 4G service, Sharma said.
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