Government orders partial shut down of GSM network in twin cities during Long March!

Orders of shutting down GSM service have been recieved by GSM operaters. The orders were sent by the regulator (PTA).

According to a source at the leading GSM company in Pakistan, orders have been recieved to shut down the service in certain areas of the twin cities at 12 midnight today till further orders.

PTCL ITI and TW1 BackBone Connectivity Affected by Submarine Cable Cut...

As luck would have it, the SMW3 and SMW4 submarine cable systems developed faults today which has severely impaired the Internet traffic to Pakistan.

At the moment, PTCL ITI is running at 25% less capacity. Users are experiencing high latency and a degraded service level resulting in extremely low speed on downloads.

TW1 also has the same issue. TW1 relies mainly on the SMW4 western segment.

The SMW4 fault is confirmed to be a sumbarine cable cut. Estimated repair time at this point-in-time is close to two weeks.

It is quite strange how multiple cable systems can be affected in different places at the same time. Is it just a coincidence?

Robin Williams: Hilarious Stand-up Comedy!

Being an old Robin Williams fan, I had to share this piece of stand-up comedy. Robin is without doubt the best stand-up comedian around! And a great actor he is too!!

The Moon: India vs Pakistan

As a South Asian, I am delighted that Indians have finally touched the Moon. Chandrayaan-I, the Indian Lunar craft finally kissed the moon by sending its probe onto the Lunar surface. You can read more about it here. Hmmm... well, I guess us pakistanis can start kissing mother Earth ... for all we are worth!... as the lovely Moon seems out of our reach anyway.

The moon is this shiny object that we see in the sky. Its like a bright yellow plate which according to old Punjabi folklore has an old lady with her spinning wheel making some sort of thread. Thank God that Chandrayaan-I didnt hurt her. Moonlight is also said to warm up the cockles of one's heart. Muslims have a particular attachment with the Moon as the Muslim calendar is based on the Moon as opposed to the Christian Gregorian Calendar, which is sort of, well, fixed. This allows some Muslims to celebrate two birthdays - one following the Muslim Calender and one with the Gregorian Calendar!. Well, who cares, as long as you are getting gifts on both birthdays! :-)

In 1969, when I was in heavens and when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, the Maulvis (clergymen) of some areas of Punjab gave the fatwa that no infidel can set foot on the moon! They went so far as to say that anyone believing that a non-muslim had set foot on their beloved Moon would actually have their marriage anulled. Lol. Fiendish clergymen must have an eye on a neighbors wife. That is the only logic that I can find for such a fatwa.

The Moon or Chaand (as is it referred to in Urdu) is a subject of profound interest in the Indo Pak culture. But that is a subject that a single post would not do justice. So more on that in some other post.

In the end, I'ld like to reproduce a photo from the daily The News so as a Nation we know where we stand viz a viz the Indians. Are we ever going to kiss the moon?

Pakistanis: Still looking for the Moon......

Mobilink's CEO Replaced? : Mr Rashid Khan from Banglalink rumuored as CEO

While it is unofficial, there is a strong rumuor that Mr Zohair Khaliq has been removed as the CEO of Mobilink GSM, Pakistan's largest cellular company, owned by Orascom Telecom and will be sent to Orascom Telecom, Egypt.

Mr Rashid Khan (ex VP Commercial Mobilink and CEO Banglalink) will be taking over as the new CEO of Mobilink.

Nokia to slash workforce in Pakistan / Afghanistan

Nokia-Siemens Pakistan will be slashing its workforce by 60% in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Nokia-Siemens major customers Telenor and Mobilink have almost entirely frozen work on new sites because of the economic condition.

Among the Pakistani GSM operators, Mobilink is probably the provider with the highest non-productive expenses and is said to be mulling a cutdown of its workforce.

Wimax: The Broadband Titanic: It's Never Going to Arrive!

A month or two ago, I raised some questions regarding Orascom's Mobilink Wimax venture under the Mobilink Infinity brandname. Well, it has just come to my knowledge that Orascom Telecom (the parent company of Mobilink) has refused to release any more funds for the Mobilink Infinity expansion in the north and central regions of Pakistan.

Rumuor has it that the Broadband Unit (BBU) within Mobilink looking after Wimax might be scrapped. The part of the BBU looking after the long haul network (DWDM, Next-Generation SDH etc) will survive.

Conned by the Private 'Federal Reserve'

Here's an excellent video from a respectable American.

FTTH in Japanese Market


(Left): Mr Masato Taguchi, Manager, New Project Development Team and (Right)Mr Wataru Kambe, General Manager FTTH Products and Promotion Office, Sumitomo Corporation

Japan has seen a phenomenal growth in the FTTU market in recent years. Mr Kambe, General Manager of Sumitomo Japan paid us a visit with Mr Tomohiro Osawa and Mr Masato Taguchi. Sumitomo is a significant player in the world Optics market and makes Fiber Optic Cable, Connecters, Splicers, Optic Splitters and other Optical components. The Fusion splicer world market is led by Fujikura with around 40% market share and Sumitomo at a close 30%.

Nayatel PON network in islamabad is designed with a radius of 20km whereas in Tokyo the radius of a PON would be close to 5km due to the density of customers. The Nayatel PON is used by banks and other commercial entities whereas in Japan most of the carriers, banks and enterprises prefer to have dedicated Point-to-Point links.

On the rise of the broadband in Japan, Mr Kambe told us that Japanese housewives were fond of having blogs and uploading Videos and Photographs. On this, I thanked God that Pakistani housewives had not developed this habit which would give them one extra excuse to boot their hubbies. However, this might just be the reason to have a Japanese wife lol. This is why the sages have said that is a dangerous species. So, these japanese housewives are among a growing crowd demanding more and more bandwidth.

The other chunk of this crowd is youngsters who want to stay indoors and don't want to move around too much. Couch Potatoes. They also want to be able to work remotely. And ADSL just doesn't cut it. So PON is THE way to go. While Nayatel PON is BPON (and soon to be GPON), GEPON rules in Japan.

Another interesting comparison is that of Electric power. There is no concept of a power outage in Japan so the FTTU installations are not supplied with a UPS as in Pakistan. All Nayatel installations in Islamabad are supplied with a custom UPS which powers the Optical Network Terminal (ONT), the box in which the fiber terminates. The UPS typically provides eight hours of backup for Triple play services. In Japan, power backup (generators) is usually found in government buildings or hospitals.

Among the interesting Sumitomo products were Field Assembled Connecters. This nifty little thing allows the fiber technicians to connectorize fiber on-the-spot without the need for a splicing machine!! This is way cool! Another item of interest was the bend-insensitive fiber. You could literally take this fiber optic cable and wrap it around a pencil and it would still show zero optical loss !. Way to go Sumitomo!!