Telikom’s US$200m upgrade

 By HELEN TARAWA

Telikom PNG and shareholder, Independent Public Business Corporation, have undertaken a US$200 million (K149m) project on upgrading the telecommunication network in the country.

The project involves upgrading the old copper network, which was installed many years ago as part of the cooperation between Australia and PNG, and replacing it with the fibre optic network.

Telikom CEO Michael Donnelly said it was a major investment for Telikom and the state.

“It’s like building roads with major structures and it’s ongoing, fibre optic is the latest technology and that’s the advantage we have here,” he said.

“The capacity is enormous, it’s an amazing technology, everything travels at the speed of light, we are using light wave lengths to transmit data and internet traffic, that’s why it’s so efficient.

“We’re upgrading the old copper network, which is quite old and where we can reutilise copper to deliver ADSL to the homes, we’re installing high quality electronic boxes which enables you to have data to your homes via the old network. 

“That’s once again a standard practice around the world, where you can leverage copper there’s a lot of innovations on electronics at either end, you can actually split those fibres.

Donnelly said in parts of the urban areas, they are completely replacing the copper network with brand new fibre to cater for the new premises or new buildings that are being constructed.

He said as part of the project Telikom is providing fibre optic network directly to banks and a lot of the mining infrastructure companies.

“The banks are very keen to have fibre directly to their premises that enables them to deliver highly efficient services to their customers where connectivity is maintained all the time,” he said.  

“And the Government wants to deliver services these can be transacted electronically and this project accommodates the future capacity of business and private sector users of these services.”