Confed Cup encountered no telecommunication glitches: Telkom
This year's FIFA Confederations Cup - played during the month of June - saw 100% broadcast efficiencies being enabled by the backbone ICT infrastructure that was provisioned by Telkom.
"In terms of our role in the broadcast value chain regarding communications provisioning for the Confederations Cup, there was not a single moment’s downtime that was experienced," said Thami Magazi, Telkom’s Group Executive for Multi-National Customers.
He added: "The Telkom core network was stable for the duration of the entire tournament without a single incident on our network impacting customer service. Our ASTN (Automatic Switching Transfer Network) which ensured a built-in redundancy or back-up, as well as the second Telkom hub within each stadium, guaranteed that no network-related glitches on Telkom's side resulted in customer services being interrupted."
Magazi explained that the efficiency of Telkom's network monitoring tools, which were complemented by the Group's highly vaunted Network Operations Centre (NOC), enabled the early detection and response to possible interruptions to service provisioning.
"As was required, the telecommunications solution that was defined and refined by Telkom provided for 99.99% availability with no single point of failure. We were able to surpass this," stated Magazi.
Besides the four Confederation Cup stadia - Loftus Versveld, Coca-Cola Park, Royal Bafokeng and Bloemfontein - Telkom's telecommunications equipment also extended to four hotels, four ticketing centres, FIFA's headquarters at Sandton, SAFA house in Johannesburg, a Data Centre which included several VPNS (Virtual Private Network Supreme) links, the welcome desk at the OR Tambo Airport and the PC Factory based in Isando.
"The ubiquity, resilience and reliability of Telkom's infrastructure were surpassed only by the expertise and determination of our personnel to ensure a successful Confederations Cup and, by extension, the 2010 FIFA World Cup as well," said Magazi.
"We have built a dedicated and highly capable team who are committed to making 2010 a bigger success than this year’s Confederation Cup. The experience they have gained, coupled with their expertise and indomitable attitude will stand us in better stead come 2010," enthused Magazi.
He emphasised, though, that Telkom will not rest on its laurels despite delivering a flawless FIFA Confederations Cup. "Despite our achievements, we are carefully dissecting how we could perform with greater efficiency and effectiveness for the final draw that takes place on 4 December 2009 in Cape Town and the 2010 FIFA World Cup tournament itself," concluded Magazi.