in this issue - Al Bayan Magazine

GITEX DUBAI 2012
تكنولوجيا
Drew Brandy (Vice president of the industry sector in Inmarsat):
Our new satellites will issue a new era of voice and data communiucations
and will give us capacity over Europe, Africa & Midlle East
Inmarsat is a British satellite telecommunications company,
offering global, mobile services. It provides telephony and
data services to users worldwide, via portable or mobile
terminals which communicate to ground stations through eleven
geostationary telecommunications satellites. Inmarsat’s network
provides communications services to a range of governments, aid
agencies, media outlets and businesses with a need to
communicate in remote regions or where there is no reliable
terrestrial network. Al Bayan Magazine met the Vice President of
Inmarsat and conducted this interview with him.
* What are your latest realizations in the
region
- We are very proud that we’ve recently hit a hundred
thousands handset for the service that we
launched just two years ago and we’ve really
seen a new market develop in terms of new
users for the product but the innovation doesn’t
stop there. We are launching a new generations
of satellites in 2013, the I-files which will be delivered
across the kband protocol will issue a new
era of voice and data communications offering
speeds between 5 and 50 mega pixels per second
on a global basis. We are also launching our
alpha sat satellite which will give us additional
capacity over Europe and parts of Africa & the
Middle East and introducing higher data rate
streaming services for media customers and
customers who need to send real time data
because there are a lot of changes going on and
we are continuing to evolve an innovator
portfolio offerings.
* How did the political situation in the
region affect the development of Inmarsat
- We have been in business since 1979 and
we’ve worked with regulators around the globe to
be able to provide our services and obviously as
those regulations change, we need to make sure
that we comply with them. We recently hired
someone in the Middle East who has got responsibility
for the regulatory aspect to the business
here to make sure that we defacing quite closely
with the TRA to ensure that we are compliant and
we are working to ensure that we can still deliver
our services to our network partners in the region.
* How Innmarsat is improving itself within
the big competition in the region
- There is always competition in the market
and particularity in this region. We recognize
that obviously some of the competitors based
in this region are building relationships with
customers that we are ultimately looking to
work with but because we’ve been in business
over 30 years, we’ve got a history of
introducing and delivering products and
services that address our customers
requirements and we continue to develop new
capabilities and bring those to market that
enable our customers to address their
requirements when broadcast in the globe.
* Which market is considered potential for
Inmarsat to be in
- Middle East and Africa are significant line
regions where services are used intensively.
There is so much development from North
America & China going into the African market
that is absolutely critical that we are present in
that market and delivering reliable communications
and in many parts of Africa, there isn’t a
reliable 3G network and terrestrial infrastructure
so satellite is the best alternative and
option for delivering communications.
* What is the purpose behind your
participation in Gitex
- Simply, it is the most important show in the
region and it is important for us to be here to
support our channel partners and to continue
to deliver the message that Inmarsat is changing
its portfolio in line with customers expectations,
so we’ve been here certainly over the
last 7 years and we will continue to be here in
the coming years to make sure that we are
delivering that message to our customers.
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