The Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission has released a mandatory standard for Quality of broadband service in Malaysia starting 1 January 2008.

Here are the conclusions(Applies to all ISPs):

• 80% of installation orders must be fulfilled within 24 hours from the time and date requested by the customer.
• 80% of service restoration must be completed within 24 hours from the time and date requested by the customer.
• 90% of billing complaints must be resolved in 15 business days of receipt of the complaint.
• Network latency to the nearest edge node(BRAS), shall be no more than 85ms(95% of the time)
• Bandwidth utilisation between the user and the nearest edge node of the regional broadband network(BRAS) should be no less than 80% of the subscribed level(95% of the me)-it means local sites will load faster
• Packet loss should not exceed 1% between the user and the nearest edge node of the regional broadband network(BRAS)

BRAS-Broadband Remote Access Server

On top of all theses mandatory standards, all ISPs must produce a report to MCMC every six months.

Mandatory Standards for Quality of Service(Broadband Access Service)-PDF file

The question is:

• What if the customers are still not satisfied on the service offered? (MCMC will be judging the service based on the report produced by the ISPs, what about consumers?)
• Do I still pay RM77 when service is always not available, or when the technical guy is taking his sweet time to come over to my place?
• What happens to the ISPs if the mandatory standards are not fulfilled?
• Why “best effort” still remains? Does MCMC support these terms?
• Why wait until January,2008? Does it mean that we will suffer until then and no action can be taken on the ISP?

Comments are most welcomed.

Update: You can read more on this at : http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/486176

Since this is a relatively short article, I’m pasting the whole thing in. Certain parts have been bolded for emphasis. Read further on to find out what this could mean for us Malaysians. This article is from the Business Times. Thanks to Paul Tan� for the article tip!

Read below:

MALAYSIA is now a step closer to becoming a regional Internet hub, thanks to the partnership between Telekom Malaysia Bhd ™ and Verizon Business.

TM and the US phone firm signed an initial pact to set up a centre in Cyberjaya, which could be jointly operated.

The centre would help attract giant content developers like Google or Yahoo! to host its websites in Malaysia.

For TM, the setting up of the local Internet hub could help save costs “significantly”, said group chief executive officer Datuk Abdul Wahid Omar.

For local Internet surfers, they would be able to open local websites faster and see an improvement in download speed.

“The memorandum of understanding will provide an impetus for Malaysia to become a regional transit hub for global Internet service providers routing traffic.

“In fact, our current Internet traffic in and out of Malaysia is already one of the highest in the region, exceeding some of our more established neighbours,” said Abdul Wahid, who represented TM at the signing ceremony. Representing Verizon Business was its vice president for strategy and finance John Doherty.

Conclusions

In summary, this is good news, for the future. Personally I’m surprised that TM is open to working with a foreign provider. One of the more interesting lines is that Malaysia can become a “regional transit hub for global Internet service providers routing traffic” - this means our packets don’t need to travel from US, to Hong Kong, then to Singapore, then here. Yay! This is perhaps, the most visible benefit so far from the novation of internet services from TMNet, to the parent company TM. (Its doubtful that TM Net would be able to tie up with Verizon). But keep in mind that this is only PLANNED. The word “impetus” basically means potential. Which means that it only means that with this, Malaysia has the potential to become a hub.

The more immediate benefit is merely being able to access local websites faster. Yes, just Malaysian sites. Good news for technopreneurs like myself, and to extent certain internet users who mainly view local content. While I hope that goes through well, I really think the international links (the way Malaysia’s connected to the rest of the world) more than anything else need more attention.

Here’s also the link to the site for Verizon Business Malaysia. Notice the contradiction though - the news report from Business Times says “The centre would help attract giant content developers like Google or Yahoo! to host its websites in Malaysia. ” However, the Verizon Business Malaysia website says ” Verizon Business offers access to its services to non-US based carriers and customers, subject to legal and regulatory requirements and network availability.” So does this mean that the “Google & Yahoo” reference is wrong? (Yes, Yahoo and Google are US based companies, if you didn’t know already).

It remains to be seen though whether TM’s incompetence will infect or hinder its foreign partner…

But congratulations, TM. It’s a good step. You’ve proven yourself better than some other local GLCs who have been shuffling their feet on foreign tieups which would obviously benefit them, due to having misguided notions of nationalism (Proton with Volkswagen, for instance). This is a good move - like DiGi with Telenor, like Celcom with Vodafone.

TM - as the current monopolistic provider of whom we Malaysians have no choice but to use, its nice to see you actually getting better (which would make supporting your monopoly kind of worth it if you could do the whole “smart thinking” and “good service” thing regularly)!

Here’s a pat on the back. Now, back to work. I’ll like to talk you regarding my bandwidth being throttled…

After having dug to a depth of 1000 meters last year, Swedish scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 1000 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 1000 years ago.

Not to be outdone by the Swedes, in the weeks that followed, English scientists dug to a depth of 2000 meters and shortly after headlines in the UK newspapers read; English archaeologists have found traces of 2000 year old fiber-optic cable and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech digital communications network a thousand years earlier than the Swedes.

One week later, Malaysian newspapers reported the following: After digging as deep as 5000 meters in padi fields in Kedah, Malaysian scientists have found absolutely nothing. They, therefore, have concluded that 5000 years ago, Malaysian’s inhabitants were already using wireless technology.

From the Reapfield Technology Blog.

I got notified this from a reader, and managed to confirm that eB Technologies is no longer taking new residential signups, and will only be doing corporate broadband for the time being. From the looks of it, a representative said it was “temporary”, but has not given a timeline.

They will continue to serve existing customers though. I wonder why they decided to do this - is it that hard to make a profit from residential broadband? That being said, I sympathize with them - having to compete with Streamyx’s marketing budget (billboards, tv commercials, direct mail, and all) is not easy.

� Translation: We have another satellite in space now, and that’s a good thing for broadband here.� Malaysia Boleh! Soon we’re going to have a bolehnaut and teh tarik in space too, but that’s a different story.

Translation: This can shape up to be a significant challenge to TM Net Streamyx’s market dominance. As you might notice from this Wikipedia link on Maxis, they basically own Measat-3. Although the main purpose of the satellite is to extend the coverage of sister company Astro’s satellite services, it is very likely that the broadband capabilities of the new satellite will be marketed as under the Maxis Broadband umbrella rather than as an Astro broadband thing. Maxis already has very good dominance in the urban mobile telecommunications sector, so getting existing mobile customers to subscribe to a broadband package shouldn’t be too far a stretch, rather than trying to convince Astro watchers to get broadband.� This is purely my speculation, and adding credence to it is the fact that� Astro did have a short-lived trial of internet services, but no news has been hard since.

Translation: No more coverage issues. No 5KM radius DSLAM limitation. No more� not enough ports problems. No more reliance on old copper cabling. Rather than try to depend on the underground, broadband can now come from the heavens above, and anywhere with a clear line of sight to the sky should be able to receive a satellite broadband signal. Bonus: The launch vehicle of the satellite is called the “Proton Breeze M”. No, it’s not a new car model from national carmarker Proton Berhad, but rather, this link should explain it.

Let’s end with two questions:
1. Do you think satellite broadband internet services� are already available currently, as of today, right now? Yes or No? (This one I know the answer to. It might not be what you think.� Btw, if the answer is yes, it’s not Measat providing it. If it’s no, then no one� lah. What do you think?)
2. If satellite broadband were already available here…how much would you pay per month for a good, steady 1-2MBps connection?

Sure, we were late on the news of his resignation, but I hope we’ve redeemed ourselves by being one of the first to tell you where he’s going next.According to an industry insider (from a company working closely with Green Packet), after resigning as CEO of TMNet, Michael Lai will join the highly hyped Green Packet Berhad. No word yet on his position, but speculation says he might be the new CEO.

He might make quite a difference, judging by the some favourable comments from industry people. Michael is currently on holiday and not in KL. Word is he left TM Net because of unfair corporate structure - underlings were promoted, and key performance indicators for the National Broadband Plan are no longer in his hands, making his role very small.

It is also said that there will no new CEO replacing Michael Lai (there is a current acting CEO, a Malay lady named Zainab Hashim), as there is no need to - operations of TM Net will be going to the main TM Group. Products and marketing of Streamyx will go to TM Retail, and Technical & Content will go to TM Wholesale (who has been doing a shitty job as of late.) TMNet will be handling content like BlueHyppo & the music portal.

However, the industry insider goes on to say that Streamyx will improve drastically in a year - this new restructuring will bring younger people to the helm (between 30-40), to replace the traditional guys. And…it won’t be called TM Net Streamyx anymore - it will be TM Streamyx.

Green Packet Berhad is pretty well backed, with support from Energy, Water & Communications Minister Datuk Seri Dr Lim Keng Yaik. To quote Datuk Seri Dr Lim Keng Yaik: “Green Packet had proven itself to be one of Malaysia’s technology companies with an impressive track record locally and was also creating a significant impact in international telecommunication services. ” Check out this link on The Star - Landmark Green Packet Deal and this link, on Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia. You can also see their corporate fact sheet on GreenPacket.com.

So, will Green Packet be able to “gerak” broadband to the “Rakyat”? They will benefit from Michael’s marketing savvy (as who else knows the weaknesses of the main monopoly ISP better?), but let’s hope their service holds up as well. Congratulations to Michael Lai, and Green Packet.

More updates as times goes by…remember nothing here is guaranteed to be accurate, and is based on speculation and insider info. Let’s hope this new round of restructuring in TM and Green Packet will bring about some much needed change to us, the broadband users.

James pointed me out to an interesting forum thread. It details the story of a guy who through persistence and documentation, actually managed to get a rebate from Streamyx.� Basically, he was paying for a 1MBPs line, but for some reason, was capped at 512KBPs.� Here’s an excerpt from the forum:

You can read the whole forum thread here: Malaysia Bloggers Forum - Damn Streamyx!

�

Jaring Communications Sdn Bhd is looking to grow its high-speed Internet broadband subscriber base through strategic partnerships with housing developers.

It has tied up with property developer, Asia Pacific Land Bhd (AP Land) and Internet service provider, BTP Wireless Sdn Bhd, to provide wireless broadband services at AP Land’s Bandar Tasik Puteri township development.

Read the full article at The Edge Daily�