Everything about Etisalat totally explained
Emirates Telecommunications Corporation, also known as
Etisalat (former Emirtel), is the incumbent
telecommunications carrier and
Internet Service Provider in the
United Arab Emirates. Founded in 1976, it was the sole telecommunications services provider in the UAE until the arrival of
Du in February 2007.
Etisalat
provides a wide range of fixed and wireless telecommunications services, as well as
cable TV services. As of January 2008, Etisalat is thought to operate over 33 million subscribers in 15 countries, following a spending spree of
AED 30 billion in international acquisitions and investments, largely due to the loss of its virtual monopoly in the United Arab Emirates.
The telecom's wireless services coverage is claimed to reach 97% of UAE's territory. According to the official news agency of the United Arab Emirates (WAM),
"At the end of September 2005, the number of lines in service are: 1,222,905 fixed telephone lines, 4,305,821 mobile telephone lines and 469,817 Internet subscriber lines. Mobile telephony penetration exceeds 95%."
Etisalat has been ranked by the
Financial Times Global 500 among the world's largest corporations, currently taking the 444th spot (as of 2007)
(External Link). In September 2006
Forbes Arabia ranked it as the 6th largest company in the region in terms of market capitalization and revenues. The corporation is also a major contributor to the UAE's federal budget and is among the largest contributors (apart from the oil and gas sector) to development programs of the UAE Federal Government. Currently the operator pays 50% of its operational profits to the federal government as a royalty fee, although there are speculations that in future this figure could be reduced to 40%
(External Link).
International Expansion
Etisalat International is the company's business unit that operates outside the
UAE and manages Etisalat stakes in telecommunications carriers in Afghanistan, Benin, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, Ivory Coast, Egypt, Gabon, Niger, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo and Pakistan.
One of Etisalat's first international investments was the bid to become the second mobile services operator in Saudi Arabia. Ettihad Etisalat, a consortium led by Etisalat, has won the
2G GSM license by offering USD $3.25 billion. Currently operating under the brand name Mobily, Etihad Etisalat offers Saudi Arabia subscribers conventional and
3G mobile telephony services, and has floated shares on the Saudi stock market.
Among the acquisitions of Etisalat in 2005 was a 26% management stake in Pakistan Telecommunications (PCTL) that was put on sale by the government of Pakistan as part of a large privatization initiative. In order to outbid competitors (which included Singapore Telecom and China Mobile), Etisalat offered USD $2.56 billion for the stake. According to some analysts, Etisalat has overpaid, as the bid went far beyond the estimated USD $2 billion value of the package
(External Link).
In July 2006, a consortium led by Etisalat has been granted the rights to develop Egypt's third mobile network, with a winning bid of 16.7 billion
Egyptian Pound (
EUR 2.29 billion)
(External Link). The new venture,
Etisalat Egypt, will compete with existing service providers
Vodafone and
Mobinil. On September 12, 2006, it was announced that the network will be built by
Ericsson of
Sweden, and
Huawei of
China, at a cost of approximately
USD $1.2 billion
(External Link).
Other telecommunications services providers that Etisalat has invested in include CanarTel in Sudan, Atlantique Telecom (offering services in Benin, Burkina Faso, Niger, Cote d’Ivoire, Togo, Gabon and Central African Republic), Zantel (Tanzania), Etisalat Afghanistan,
Thuraya.
Internet Services
Etisalat has unrolled
3G network services in 2004 and has begun shitfing its partially aging infrastructure towards an IP-based
NGN core.
For home users, Etisalat provides
dial-up,
ISDN, cable and
DSL Internet connectivity services. Etisalat's broadband connections are known as "Al Shamil" and offer speeds between 256kbit/s to 4Mbit/s.
Etisalat also operates iZone - a system of WiFi hotspots in central locations, such as
shopping malls,
restaurants, and
sheesha cafes. iZone can be utilized by either purchasing prepaid cards, which offers access rates of AED 15/hour (about USD $4.5/hour), or if one holds an existing account with the operator, paying AED 3/hour (dial-up account holders), or AED 6/hour (broadband account holders).
Dial-up and
ISDN Internet access services are billed by the hour, whereas the Domestic/Residential Cable and
DSL connections have a fixed monthly rate depending on speed. Other Internet links, aimed at business users, have traffic utilization plans and relatively high rates when exceeding the allocated bandwidth quota. This has caused bad publicity for Etisalat and is a major source of criticism.
Business Units
The Emirates Telecomminications Corporation - Etisalat incorporated several semi-independent business units, each focused on the provisioning of a different type of service.
For example, the former
eCompany business unit (also previously known as "Emirates Internet & Multimedia"), was UAE's main
Internet Service Provider (
ISP);
e-Marine is the name of the unit, operating Etisalat's
submarine communications cable laying ships;
e-Vision is the UAE's only terrestrial
cable television services provider;
Ebtikar is the manufacturer of various
smart card products;
Etisalat Academy is a unit providing training and consultancy services;
As of 2008, the company is finalizing a restructuring program that will see only three main business units operating - Etisalat, Etisalat Services and Etisalat International. As part of the program, Etisalat has launched a re-branding campaign, releasing a new corporate logo and identity in May 2006.
Internet Censorship
Etisalat has blocked thousands of websites on the web due to various reasons; the statement on the "ban screen" states that websites may be banned due to their content contravening the religious, cultural, political, and moral values of the United Arab Emirates.
These websites include:
- Pornography
- The entire Israel TLD (.il)
- Certain social-networking websites (such as Orkut, Multiply, last.fm, Zune Social etc.)
- Certain media-sharing websites (such as flickr, and user pages on YouTube)
- Anti-Islamic websites
- Certain websites which cover aspects of the United Arab Emirates in a critical manner such as uaeprison.com, hetq.am and arabtimes.com
- Anonymous proxy sites (vtunnel, pzeg etc..)
- "Most" File-sharing sites (torrents etc.)
- Certain Homosexual websites (such as Gaydar, Mogenic etc.)
- Numerical IP address links (for example, http://255.255.255.255/)
- Blocking sections of informational websites such as Wikipedia.
Based upon the directions of the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of the United Arab Emirates, Etisalat blocks some services, such as
VoIP.
Skype is one such service blocked by Etisalat. Many see this action as a move to protect the profits of the telecommunications industry.
Etisalat's "we'll do whatever we want" attitude towards its customers is starting to annoy a lot of people and many of them are now looking at other alternatives to access the Internet.
Etisalat has also been known to temporarily block earlier accessible torrent websites and throttling P2P in order to ease load on their servers.
The effect of blocking is unclear, as sites are accessible to people using IP spoofing software and with some sites increasing the amount of visits from the UAE only after blocking.
Criticism
Above average telephone charges, especially in the case of international calls (although this, as of recently, can be attributed to the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority which prohibits price-wars between the UAE's telephone companies) although they've special offers that compensate for the not so high-price calls.
Excessive delay in paying for PTCL, Pakistan Telecommunication Company which it bought. It got its contract renegotiated after the sale took place, which has been heavily criticized within the country.
Proxy blocks websites usually through an automated system which is prone to mistakes; though, the company doesn't take long time to respond to questions and inquiries about the blocked websites. They also block some YouTube videos and user pages.
The nature of the routing Etisalat uses means many users go through a single IP address when accessing the internet, in cases of vandalism, this means many users can be banned due to a single user's activities
Blocking all Voice Over IP (VoIP) communication which allows users cheaper international calls, such as Skype and Yahoo! Phone Out
With a 1Mbit connection the download speed can be as high as 120Kbytes and the upload speed will be around 13Kbytes, If you pay for a 2Mbits connection, the speed can be as high as approx. 250KBytes/s and upload speed as high as 35kB/s. 4Mbits connection gives you double the download transfer rate at approx. 430KBytes/s, but the upload speed won't go higher than 55kB/s.
Connection to most servers around the world won't give you the 430kB/s (4Mb) download speed.
Very poor customer service and the absence of any customer care ethics.
End users affected by their monopoly.Further Information
Get more info on 'Etisalat'.
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