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30 September 2014

Telkom announces initial roll-out of LTE Advanced

 
Telkom today announced it will begin the roll-out of its LTE Advanced (LTE-A) connectivity, in more than 50 suburbs across South Africa, by the end of this year.
 
Considered to be the next evolution of high speed wireless connectivity, LTE-A can potentially offer speeds of up to 3Gbps. Telkom has started its LTE-A journey and is currently upgrading its network to offer customers peak speeds of over 200 Mbps, with a view to developing its network to ultimately deliver LTE-A peak speeds of 3Gbps.
 
Telkom Chief Operating Officer, Dr Brian Armstrong said, “LTE-A is an integral part of Telkom’s high speed broadband strategy. We believe that, in the coming years, LTE-A will become the de facto mobile data standard.
 
“Our LTE-A platform runs on the 2.3GHz spectrum, which is unique to Telkom. The spectrum allows us to offer efficient, high quality and stable LTE-A technology, to our customers. The speeds offered on this technology are comparable to those offered over fibre connections, therefore offering an unparalleled wireless Internet experience.”
 
Dr Armstrong said Telkom aims to have the first areas connected during the course of December. “We anticipate the initial roll-out will be complete by March 2015. The precise LTE-A product offerings and prices are still to be announced, but we can confirm we will offer bigger bundles and greater speeds for an enhanced wireless connectivity experience,” he said.
 
The initial LTE-A roll-out will enable peak connectivity speeds of over 200Mbps to selected suburbs identified in Gauteng, KwaZulu Natal and the Western Cape.  The specific suburbs to be covered in this initial roll-out are:
 
Details regarding the LTE-A packages and pricing of the services will be made available in due course.

For further enquiries, please contact:

Pynee Chetty

Senior Specialist: Media Relations

Group Communication

Tel:+27 12 642 1716

Mobile: +27 81 389 7874

Email: chettpr2@telkom.co.za

OR

Leigh-Ann Francis

Specialist: Media Relations

Group Communication

Tel: +27 12 642 1728

Mobile: +27 81 391 4780

Email: francilm@telkom.co.za

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ABOUT TELKOM:

Telkom is a leading communications services provider in South Africa. We had consolidated operating revenue of R16.8 billion and normalised profit after tax of R1, 683 million for the period ended 30 September 2015. Total assets amounted to R41.9 billion and equity attributable to the owners of Telkom to R23.5 billion as of 30 September 2015. The group generated normalised free cash flow of R1.4 billion for the period ended 30 September 2015.

As of 30 September 2015, we had approximately 3.3 million telephone access lines in service and 1,030,441 ports connected via MSAN access. We offer business, residential and payphone customers a wide range of services and products, including:

  • fixed-line retail voice services using PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) lines, including ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) lines, and the sale of subscription based value-added voice services and calling plans;
  • fixed-line customer premises equipment rental and sales services both voice and data needs and these include PABX, Computers, Routers, Modems, Telephone handsets and other ancillary equipment;
  • interconnection services, including terminating and transiting traffic from South African mobile operators, as well as from international operators and transiting traffic from mobile to international destinations;
  • fixed-line data services, including domestic and international data transmission services, such as point-to-point leased lines, ADSL (Asymmetrical Digital Subscriber Line) services, packet-based services, managed data networking services and internet access and related information technology services;
  • Data Centre Operations includes e-commerce, application service provider, hosting, data storage, e-mail and security services;
  • W-CDMA (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access), a 3G next generation network, including fixed voice services, data services and nomadic voice services;
  • mobile communication services, including voice services, data services and handset sales through our mobile navbar-brand called Telkom Mobile;
  •  information and communication services including cloud services, infrastructure services, workspace services, global service integration management and hardware and network equipment sales locally, in seven African countries, the UK and Dubai through Business Connexion Group; and
  • other services including directory services, through Trudon (Pty) Ltd, wireless data services, through Swiftnet (Pty) Ltd.

Convergence is one of our key strategic initiatives in building a sustainable future for Telkom.  We will lead the provision of converged services in South Africa in support of our mission statement: Seamlessly connecting people to a better life.