Disclaimer: The notes below are provided as is from the meeting, without fact checking. These notes reflect - verbatim - the answers to the questions asked during the meeting.

• Meeting 1

• Ministry of Telecommunications

• May 12 2011

• Vision: make Lebanon the Arab World’s internet hub, building an internet ‘surplus’ (not deficit, as currently is the case), which will be sold to the Arab World

• Current Projects:
o IMEWE (done, pending signature of Ogero to launch)
o National fiber backbone, connecting major cities (in progress, started 2 months ago)
o 3G – 4G
 HSPA+ covering Lebanon
 LTE covering Beirut
 Huawei – MTC Touch
 Ericsson - Alfa
 Contracts acquired in open bidding process at half original cost of (35M USD vs 75M USD)
o International fiber links
 JADI (Jeddah, Amman, Damascus, Istanbul)
 Cadmous
 Tartous
o Local fiber
1. FTTx: made a call for requests by large institutions who need fiber now for at least 100 Mbps, only received 12 applicants!
2. FTTh: 2012

• Pricing:
o New pricing matrix has been drafted, awaiting government formation and Council of Ministers to implement
o Pricing matrix aims to reduce prices by at least 40%
o E1 pricing should come close to 600 USD
o Pricing reductions are always slowed down by the Ministry of Finance (as is currently the case, and was the case during the pricing reductions on the cellular services a couple of years ago)
o Ministry of Finance is not willing to reduce prices due to fear of loss of income that is being used to finance the public debt.
o FYI: Telecom revenues finance over 40% of the public debt

• Services:
o Planning Triply Play via new infrastructure

• Speed:
o Aiming to raise the average internet speed to 10 Mbps by end of 2011

• Privatization:
o Privatization is not in the best interest of the government, as it needs the telecom sector to continue financing its public debt.

• Law 431:
o The law is outdated, and needs to be revised, for example voice is separated from data, which is the reason behind most of the VOIP crackdown we’ve witnessed in the past few years
o The law has never been implemented fully, and thus is problematic in that it is being used by the Shura Council to selectively pass or block specific decisions

• TRA:
o Previous TRA head was at odds with MoT
o Current TRA head is working together with MoT
o TRA self-financing target not met, MoT still finances TRA

• Ogero:
o Is the execution ‘arm’ of the MoT, and thus without the cooperation of Ogero, many projects cannot be executed, including turning on the IMEWE
o Many projects, services, installations, and activities are on hold due to stalemate between Ogero and MoT
o Ogero Head is appointed by the Council of Ministers

• LBN OGERO Mobile 41505
o 2G network built with donated Huawei equipment in 2008/2009
o Operating without a license, purpose and activities unknown to MoT

• People to Talk to:
o Mr. Tony Hanna
o Dr. Chebaro
o Mr. Imad Abi Rashed

• IMEWE: yes, flipping the switch will result in immediate increase in quality of service, even if there is no government to reduce prices (need for Council of Ministers)

• MoT financing: Ministry of Finance has limited financing of MoT projects, and thus MoT is self-financing most of its new projects, seeing as it is a cashflow positive ministry

Priority Next Steps:
 Increase awareness about open call for FTTx requests for large entities needing over 100 Mbps
 Increase awareness about MoT activities, projects, vision, and mission

LBN OGERO Mobile 41505 - now that's a conspiracy theory if there ever were one




tags: ogero, mtc touch, alfa, zain, orascom, lebanon, beirut, lebanese, mobile, cell, 3G, 4G, mic1, mic2, conspiracy, photo, image, proof, network, ogero mobile

I will be scheduling meetings with:

Mr. Antoine Boustani (MoT)
Mr. Mahmoud Haidar (MoT)
Mr. Kamal Bou Farhat (MoT)
Dr. Imad Abi Rached (Ogero)
Dr. Imad Hoballah (TRA)

Regarding the prices from the MOT-Ogero to the ISPs which currently are at 2,700 USD per E1 per Month or 1,350 USD per Mbps per Month, this should be resolved by a Decree from the MOT and the Ministry of Finance; It is really a Lebanese Government initiative; You cannot blame one person or one party.

Regarding the connectivity from Lebanon to the outside, we have the cables:

1- CADMOS: 40 Gbps currently from Lebanon to Cyprus (ON)
2- IMEWE: 120 Gbps from Lebanon to France (OFF)
3- Berytar to Syria (?)
4- Terrestrial to Syria and Syria is connected to JADI and to RCN (?)

Also, the MOT has contracted recently for:
1- Fiber project of 4,000 KM of Fiber inside Lebanon to CET and Alcatel-Lucent;
2- DWDM contract to Ericsson to light up that fiber;
3- 3G contract of Alfa Mobile to Ericsson;
4- 3G contract of MTC Touch to Huawei;
5- Ongoing tender for FTTH;

The RFS date of the 3G is for July 2011; so we are technically as good as the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar but we need 20% efforts to light up all these capacities and provide them to the end user at good rates.

Post all your questions here.

from: Flip The Switch Group: http://on.fb.me/FlipTheSwitchGroup

tags: Communicate Magazine, Lebanon, Levant, Beirut, Blogging Beirut, Internet, Fast Lebanon, Flip The Switch, Ontornet

NOTE: we are not affiliated or related to these videos or their creators in any way

tags: anonymous, lebanon, beirut, #fastlebanon, fast lebanon, internet, lebanese, cedarcom, mobi, youtube, video, clip

OntorNet just released this cool video:




Flip The Switch Group just crossed 1100 members, and over 4000 invitees to the planning session for the upcoming demonstration!

A draft Mission Statement has been crowdsourced, and the discussions in the group have provided all members with great insight on the issues at hand, and the need to demonstrate for actionable items in the short term, while we lobby for the implementation of Law 431 in the long term.


previous post on #FlipTheSwitch campaign can be found here: >>> click


tags: lebanon, internet, imewe, fiber, submarine, cable, dark fiber, flip the switch, #fliptheswitch, beirut, lebanese, ogero, mot, tra, #ontornet, video, clip, youtube, Facebook, group, demonstration, protest, planning