MEDIA RELEASE PR37582
Yota Deployed Mobile WiMAX in Nicaragua in Record-breaking Time
MANAGUA, Dec. 16 /PRNewswire-AsiaNet/ --
Russia's Yota, the mobile services developer and provider and one of the
world's leaders in Mobile WiMAX (4G) technology, has announced the test run
of the mobile broadband 4th-generation Internet access network in Managua,
the capital of Nicaragua. The Yota network was rolled out in record
time - in three months since the beginning of construction.
During the press conference attended by representatives of WiMAX Forum,
Intel and Samsung, the strategic partners of Yota, journalists were told
about the project and its perspectives in details.
Ricardo Olarte, Northern Cone General Manager of Intel, said that "the
broadband penetration in Latin America is very low, and is the reason
why the initiative taken by Nicaragua will allow a significant leap in the
adoption of new technologies placing the country at the forefront and
generating a positive effect in people and businesses to improve the
competitiveness ofit".
In July 2009, the public international tender for 2.5-2.7 GHz spectrum
was announced in order to provide the whole territory of Nicaragua with
communications services based upon the Mobile WiMAX standard. Yota became the
winner of the tender. "The implementation of this project, which is basically
a rapid transition from dial-up and scarce fixed-line communications to 4G
technology, will pave the way in a very short time for achieving meaningful
social effects in Nicaragua," said Dr. Mo Shakouri, Vice President and board
member of WiMAX Forum.
Yota will start to operation in Nicaragua with its wireless broadband
Internet access service. Later the company plans to increase the number of
services and to concentrate on the high-quality voice services demanded in
the market.
"The record time of deployment of the network in Nicaragua shows that
Yota has accumulated the strong expertise and has created the proven network
infrastructure based on Samsung equipment. All these issues allow Yota to
deployment networks in any country in the world extremely fast," -
commented Doctor Song, Samsung Electronics
Yota services, developed during Yota's Russian project, and several types
of end-user equipment will be available to subscribers, both to end-users and
companies: USB modems, routers. The stationary VoIP device developed
specially for Nicaragua, as well as the line of inexpensive netbooks with
embedded Intel(R) WiMAX/WiFi module from the world's leading producers will
be launched in the market of the country.
These devices are scheduled for sale next spring when everyone will be allowed free use of the Yota
services before commercial use of the
network begins in mid-2010.
"We see great potential in our project in Nicaragua. The demand for
communications services in this country is enormous. According to recent
studies, the country cries out for telephony and for at least 300,000 new
Internet connections, - says Yegor Ivanov, the vice president of business
development at Yota. - Aside from Nicaragua, Yota includes Latin America, the
CIS, as well as a series of countries in Asia and Africa, a total of 75
nations, into its global expansion plan. Currently, Yota manages more than
USD 500mn of investment funds allocated for the international expansion in
2009. The company plans to raise the volume of investments to USD 1.5bn by
the end of 2010."
About Yota
Yota is the developer and supplier of innovative mobile services. Yota is
one of the world's leaders in 4G technologies development and networks
deployment. The company provides fast mobile Internet access and a set of
services based upon its network.
Yota has begun providing commercial 4G network service in Russia since
June 2009, and reached the break-even point this October, less than in five
months. In the first half of October, the subscriber base of the company
surpassed 200,000 active users at a rate of 2,500 new clients a day.
Yota offers a set of unique mobile services that utilize the capabilities
of the fast wireless Internet access: VoIP, mobile television, video content
delivery, access to the music catalog with hundreds of thousands of records
from world's leading record labels and many others.
Yota is a member of the international WiMAX Forum association which
comprises the world-leading 4G technology vendors and service providers.
Contacts for the media:
Natalya Tsarevskaya-Dyakina
Yota, PR director
+7-495-926-7585
pr@yotateam.ru
SOURCE: Yota
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