Telecom Infrastructure

The State of Kuwait

دولة الكويت

Telecom Infrastructure

With the national infrastructure being much in place in new or state-of-the-art condition, courtesy of the Gulf War, Kuwait’s Telecommunications have been fortunate.

Kuwait’s Telecom links are able to offer a wide variety of services such as Leased Lines, ISDN, DSL etc. and is quite well linked internationally via fiber optic link to what is known as FOG (Fiber Optic Gulf), a network most gulf countries enjoy supported by Cable & Wireless to the UK. FOG is jointly owned by the telecom operators of the Gulf. Kuwait also enjoys backup links to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and a number of Satellite Telecom Links such as as ArabSat, IntelSat, NileSat and InmarSat.

Local Satellite TV programming approaches 800 channels and over 2000 radio channels from all over the world thanks to many satellite providers reaching the area. This make the Kuwaiti public very well informed on the goings on of the western world and mindset. The main domestic providers using these satellite links are Showtime Arabia and ART. Both have bilingual offerings (Arabic & English). Also offered are Indian, Tamil, Hindi and Philipino channels in light of Kuwait’s huge expatriate population. Kuwait’s national TV network offers 5 channels of programming with recent On-demand service via its website.

With recent ISP deregulation a number of years ago to such companies as Qualitynet and Fastelco, the government has been fortunate to have not regretted the move as those companies continue to provide A-Class Data services to its corporate clients and ofcourse the public consumers. Recently, a third provider Zaknet has emerged offering Satellite Broadband but however, the upload via telco/DSL stipulation has ensured content controls. Additionally, Zajil Telecom has recently stepped up Kuwait to the wireless age with its wireless service offerings in the country.

The land line market is still very regulated by the Ministry of Telecommunications. However, Mobile freedom was awarded early on after the Gulf War to MTC (Mobile Telecommunications Company) which has recently partnered up with Vodafone to offer state of the art wireless services. Al-Wataniya which was launched a number of years ago has similarly emerged as a close contender. Al Wataniya’s capabilities has allowed it much action as it has even ventured outside to setup Algeria's 3rd GSM network and even infrastructure work in Iraq! In total, these are the two main Mobile Telecommunications providers.

Kuwait has not realized the need for its primary telecommunications (land-wise) to be deregulated, however, it has been quite level-headed by swiftly allowing Mobile, Satellite and Broadband services to be privately managed.

Originally, and post Gulf-War, the rebuilding of the ran-sacked telecom sector into one of the most impressive networks by such giants as AT&T, Sprint and Siemens has provided the Communications industry with a technological renaissance of its infrastructure. Coupled with successful private ventures stemming from Dubai, Kuwait has enjoyed fiber-optic backbones and backup Satellite links to say the least. The original ICT entity "K-Net" was solely government run, providing X.25 and data communication with approximately 2 years lag behind most western nations. But, with recent privatization and market openings, Qualitynet and Fastelco have both emerged as ICT providers but all under the watchful eye of the Ministry of Communications which relies on assurances of sensible content censorship and secure non-offending channels of wide area infrastructure to its clients. With the country being predominantly Islamic and with the Government mindful of certain noise groups, IT advancement rates are often hampered by excessive paper trails, licenses and approvals.

It is enlightening to say however, despite all that, Kuwait is able to offer one of the most reliable and performing IT infrastructures around. The only concerns are the comparative pricing (boosted by red-tape formalities) and speed limitations due to national security concerns.

Summary of Typical Costs:

Residential Land Line subscription: $100/yr flat rate

Commercial Land Line subccription: $250/yr flat rate

Typical Mobile Monthly fees: Starting at $40/month,

450 mins included, $0.11/min Overtime

Dialup Internet Subscription: $34/month

Broadband Internet Subscription: $65/month, 128Kbps DSL

Appropriate IT/Telecom Providers:

Internet Providers:

· http://www.qualitynet.net Original Monopoly, current Duopoly

· http://www.fastelco.com Current Duopoly

Wireless Internet Providers