Loud Thinking

Posts Tagged ‘technology’

Honourable Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani,
 
AoA.
 
It will not be out of place to begin with a news item published in the news papers today i.e., Wednesday 1 Feb. 2012, stating that the Indian Supreme Court warned on Tuesday that corruption posed a “grave danger” to the world’s largest democracy quoted as below.
 
Quote ” Today corruption in our country not only poses a grave danger for the concept of constitutional governance, it also threatens the very foundation of Indian democracy and the rule of law.” Unquote. The above was said by Justice A.K. Ganguly, while delivering a ruling in connection with the alleged underpriced selling of telecom licenses, which the national auditors says may have cost the country up to $39 billion.

An excerpt from a Times of India news published on Wednesday, 2nd Feb. 2012 is also given below for the information of Mr. Abdul Hafeez Sheikh, Finance Minister of Pakistan, who says he expects only $800 million from the COMBINED telecom auction of 3G, (4G LTE) and (5G LTE-A.) (India got $69 billion for ONLY 3G, exactly two years ago, as per TOI news quoted below.

“The 122 licences were given by Raja for over Rs 9,000 crore, while 3G auctions for a smaller number of licences had fetched the government a sum of Rs 69,000 crores.”

 
In the same context of selling of telecom licenses in Pakistan, a mega scandal is also brewing, for which your kind attention is invited to immediately intervene, so that the nefarious designs of  unscrupulous elements to defame the PPP and its government, is nipped in the bud.
 
                                          DETAILS OF THE CASE  

With the recent publication of the advertisement of PTA  in the news papers for “Invitation for Expression of Interest” (EOI) with application for AUCTION of Mobile License/Spectrum (3G/4G/LTE [long term evolution] etc), the following questions needs answers to safeguard the national interest by all and sundry.
 
1. Why the LOW base price of US $ 155 Million for one Mobile Cellular License/Spectrum (800 MHz), when this license was sold for 291 US $ Million eight years ago in the year 2002? OK, it is being auctioned for 8 years instead of 15 years, but is there no premium for above 68 % mobile teledensity which was not there eight years ago?
 
2. Why the license will be technology neutral? Which means no licenses will be required for any future launches of 4G, 5G so on so forth. this also means selling all future long term evolution inductions free of cost. This happens no where in the world. Even in Pakistan when 2G was sold in 2004, it was not permitted to launch 3G without fresh license. So why now 4G onwards is being sold free of cost?
 
3.i. Why the LOW base price of US $ 210 Million for the auction of Three Mobile Cellular Licenses/Spectrum (1900/211MHz/3G/4G/LTE etc.)? 
 
3.ii. Here it should be noted that 2G license was auctioned by PTA in 2002 at US $ 291 Million, when there was much less teledensity than 68% as of now and in the next 15 years (the period for which new licenses are being auctioned), it will obviously increase to higher levels. 
 
3.iii. And above all this auction is technology neutral, which means license for 3G is also valid for FREE for 4G, 5G onwards. Under this situation this base price of US $ 210 Million is ridiculously low.
 
4. As per IM (Information Memorandum) on PTA website all three telecom companies winning the technology neutral AUCTION of Mobile License/Spectrum (3G/4G/LTE [long term evolution] etc) will be required to pay half of the bid value within 30 days in USD or PKR. Also Rest of the amount can be paid in USD or PKR in five equal yearly installments. This virtually means that Telecom companies will NOT bring any fresh foreign investment and also the remaining 50% amount will be deposited on PAY AS YOU EARN basis. This tantamount to robbing the nation of valuable FDI in the garb of auction terms, particularly when bidding is only allowed in minimum 2 million USD and maximum 10 million USD. So when bidding is in USD payment should also be in USD.
 
5. Why PTA has shown less figures of total Teledensity of Pakistan (68.39) in 2010-11 at para 3.7 of (IM [information memorandum] on its website) whereas, according to its own figures in the graph shown in  the para 3.7, the total comes to (68.43)?
 
6. Why the PTA advertisement published in the news papers of 24 January, 2012 states mobile teledensity as 62% against the figures of 64.9% shown in IM at their website? 

7. India is not 70 times bigger than Pakistan in economy or any way, but it got $69 billion, that too, two years ago, from it’s auction of ONLY 3G. Why our Finance Minister has kept a budgeted amount of ONLY $800 million as expected income from the auction of NOT only 3G but 4 & 5G as well?

 
Submitted for consideration and immediate corrective action before it is too late.

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It was reported recently on a TV channel, that Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Sheikh expects 800 million USD revenue, from the auction of 3G (fast Internet) license to telecom companies.
 
It is reported that government has fixed the base price for auction to held on March 28 and 29, 2012 for 3G and 4G as 210 million USD. Whereas, 8 years ago 2G was sold at 291 million USD. (Please check and confirm this data from PTA).
 
Here, I must forewarn all and sundry, that under no circumstances, the worth of this auction amount can be less than 10 billion dollars. India got 69 billion USD from the same auction in April 2010 i.e. two years ago. Details are available at link:- https://www.snayyar.com/3g-telecom-technology-pakistan-can-earn-billions-of-usd-by-just-selling-air.html.
 
It will not be out of place to state that as reported today i.e., Wednesday 1 Feb. 2012 the Indian Supreme Court warned on Tuesday that corruption posed a “grave danger” to the world’s largest democracy quoted as below.
 
All patriotic citizens and institutions must be alert, lest we may not be cheated again, by those who sold our valuable national assets, for even less than the peanuts, in Musharraf era.

Dr. Umar Saif Named one of the World’s Top Young Innovators by MIT. Link :- http://www.lums.edu.pk/news_detail.php?id=TlRBeg

Dr. Umar Saif, Associate Professor at the School of Science of Engineering, has been recognized by MIT Technology Review as one of the top 35 innovators (TR35) in the world. In the last decade, this is the first time a Pakistani has been selected for the prestigious TR35 award.

 “The TR35 recognizes the world’s top 35 young innovators that are radically transforming technology as we know it. Their work – spanning medicine, computing, communications, energy, electronics and nanotechnology — is changing our world”, according to MIT Technology Review.

Dr. Umar Saif has been honoured for his work on technologies for the developing-world. Technologies developed by Dr. Saif’s research group and startups are used by millions of people in the developing-world. Notable among the many of these are: BitMate – that enhances the speed of Internet in the developing-world using peer-to-peer technology, and SMSall.pk – Pakistan’s largest SMS Social Network which has sent close to 4 billion SMS for users in Pakistan.

Dr. Umar Saif joins an elite group of researchers and entrepreneurs selected over the last decade. Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the co-founders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook; Jonathan Ive, the chief designer at Apple; David Karp, founder of Tumbler; Harvard Professor Alán Aspuru-Guzik for his work on Quantum computers; and MIT Neuroscientist Ed Boyden, one of the inventors of the emerging field of optogenetics, which makes it possible to control neurons with light.

MIT Technology Review selects the top innovators after a rigorous evaluation process. Judges, who are leading experts in their fields from universities such as MIT, Stanford and Harvard, consider hundreds of high-impact researchers and entrepreneurs from all over the world, out of which top 35 are chosen for the award.

“This year’s group of TR35 recipients is driving the next wave of transformative technology and making an impact on the way we live, work and interact”, said Jason Pontin, editor-in-chief and publisher of the MIT Technology Review.

Dr. Saif has won numerous awards for his innovative technology solutions for the developing-world. He was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2010. He is a recipient of the MIT Technovator Award (Grassroot Technologies); Mark Weiser Award for best paper award at PERCOM, the top rated conference in the field of pervasive computing; Digital Inclusion Award from Microsoft Research and the IDG CIO Technology Pioneer Award. Before moving to Pakistan, Saif worked at MIT and received a PhD from the University of Cambridge. He is a Fellow of the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust.

“We are immensely proud of this recognition for Dr. Saif and of how it reflects on the cutting edge work being done at our young School of Science and Engineering”, said Adil Najam, Vice Chancellor of LUMS.  “Dr. Saif’s work demonstrates not only the potential for innovation in technology for development but also the level of enterprise and expertise that already exists within Pakistan and the larger developing world.”

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For further inquiries email at communications@lums.edu.pk