Kerala all set to become the next IT destination

Aswathy Sreekumar

Thiruvananthapuram, Mar 9

The establishment of a landing point for South Africa Far East (SAFE) optic fiber cable at Kochi, the commercial capital of Kerala by Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd (VSNL) and the resultant scramble for establishing gateways by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have thrown up huge opportunities for telecom, small ISP's and cable operators for providing last mile connectivity. Kochi is the only landing point for $ 600 million SAFE, a submarine fiber optic project in the subcontinent.

Reliance (500 km of cable) and Bharti-Telecom Asianet combine (350 km) which has already started laying optic fiber network in the state as a prelude to setting up their own gateways, have indicated that their landing points would be at the district headquarters alone. This means another service provider will have to provide last mile connectivity to the customer's premises in the case of leased lines. 

Here, both Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), Software Technology Parks India (STPI), small ISP's and cable operators such as Siticable and Asianet will have tremendous potential to generate business, according to G Vijayraghavan, former CEO, Technopark and President, Venture Management Associates, a consultancy firm here. 

Vsplash.com, Exact Communications Satyam Infoway are also reportedly planning to set up gateways in Kochi for bandwidth as well as payment gateways for financial institutions. Among the private players keen to tap the last mile connectivity boom, includes BPLNET.com and NetDDL, a Kerala based ISP. 

"We have applied for getting IP addresses and IP pool as a prelude to providing leased line connectivity, " according to Mathew Varghese, VP-Operations, NETDDL. There will be a huge demand for providing last mile connectivity, he added. At present, it is only BSNL that is able to provide connectivity throughout the state.

Meanwhile, the joint venture proposal of STPI with IT firms to provide last mile connectivity to firms within Technopark has not been received well by either the state IT department or the government. STPI claims that it could provide last mile connectivity at a cheaper cost and provide adequate maintenance support. STPI has the limitation that it can provide connectivity to only export oriented software units. 

Kerala Circle of BSNL which has lot of unused bandwidth along its fiber optic network in the state, may also find the demand for providing last mile connectivity go up towards the year-end when SAFE project is commissioned in Kochi.

With VSNL effecting a tariff reduction of 70 percent for leased line connections in Kochi, the commercial capital of Kerala is set to become the next major IT destination in South India.