Telecom: Bhutan Telecom (BT) expects to remove 90 percent of the problems related to B-mobile services and its connectivity by September this year.
BT’s chief executive officer (CEO), Tshewang Gyeltshen, said the company would spend USD 7.491M to improve mobile connectivity services across the country.
“It’s a big investment,” the CEO said, accepting the current complaints from the public today. “We’re planning to work through all the problems.”
Tshewang Gyeltshen attributed the current problems to timeworn equipment, outdated system, and towers. Some of them are unable to cater to the services required and have to be replaced.
According to BT officials, the towers’ capacities also need expansion. “The towers have certain capacity as per the number of users,” the CEO said, adding the capacity has to be increased if the number of users increased. “Users have increased tremendously.”
BT officials also made it clear that it would take time, because the coverage was huge. However, work started since last December.
The CEO, meanwhile, said there were limited people with the capacity to do the required expansion work. “Having deployed people in problematic pockets, problems in many areas have been solved.”
Meanwhile, officials also mentioned that the BT base was “small,” meaning the market was not huge and the revenue low, unlike in other countries.
Given the constant change in technology, the costs incurred in any telecom works were huge, officials said. BT CEO said people want fast service at cheap rates, which, according to him, was hard to maintain.
“However, our motto is to provide the most reliable and effective services,” Tshewang Gyeltshen said.
In 2013, the company also invested Nu 200M and has currently carried out two systems’ audits.
Rajesh Rai