The Parkhurst Residents and Business Owners Association (PRABOA) has announced the selection of Vumatel to provide fibre to the home (FTTH) capabilities to Parkhurst, Johannesburg.
HumanIPO reported last month the PRABOA had issued a tender for the provision of FTTH services to South African telecommunications companies.
“The adjudication committee, comprised of Parkhurst residents, reviewed 16 proposals from operators such as MTN, Vodacom, Telkom, Dark Fibre Africa, SA Digital Villages, ATEC, Liquid Telecoms, ClearlineIS, Posix and Cool Ideas. Security providers Cortac and CSS also submitted proposals,” the organisation said.
However Vumatel was chosen to provide fibre services to the area.
The company is a new entrant to the FTTH market and is headed up by Niel Shoeman, a founder of Conduct Telecommunications SA.
Vumatel’s proposal includes a one-off payment of ZAR2,500 (US$233) per household, line speeds of 4Mbps, offered free of charge, 50Mbps at ZAR499 (US$47) per month and 1Gbps at ZAR1,299 (US$121) per month.
Alternatively residents have the alternative of purchasing from a number of competing providers.
“By decoupling the line cost from the bandwidth cost, we’re ensuring that residents will have a wide choice of operators through which they can purchase bandwidth,” the PRABOA said.
The organisation said the FTTH initiative came about as a result of slow broadband speeds in the area, and is expected to take up to 12 months to roll out.
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