Miguel Angel Pesado, Direct of satellite solutions of the state company Arsat, stated yesterday in the second session day of the event “Net Nap 2012. Integración Regional”, held by Grupo Convergencia in Mar del Plata, that the satelliet Arsat 3 will operate in the Ka band. “The world is focusing on Ka Band, and the entire region is struggling to get this position, which other countries had taken”, the officer explained to Convergencia.
Additionally, he assured that the delay in the launching of the first communication satellite, that was scheduled for the end of 2013, resulted from a seizure of parts for the construction of equipments and from different obstacles hindering the manufacturing: “For example, we had to create a special adhesive because those existing in the market could not bear the unions of plates at certain heights. There are always new challenges, which we did not predict, but we are making a strong effort so that we could meet the forecast timetable. Therefore, we carry out mitigation mechanisms in order to get to the originally set date,” he said. Regarding the plan “Argentina Conectada” (Connected Argentina), it has already laid 6,600 kilometers of fiber optic.
The panel “El impacto de los Nap y de las políticas del Estado Nacional” (Impacts of Nap and National State policies) was also attended by Horacio Martinez, CEO of Grupo Datco, who made a presentation on the development of Cloud Computing in the country: “Today, we are almost aligned to the last things in the world market; there are not longer barriers for the adoption of technology. But the percentage of territory capable of adopting the cloud is quite small since in order to develop this tool fiber optic networks with last mile high speed connections are required, as well as the Backbone network, ultra-fast Backhaul, and Data Centers. This reality is changing as a result of two projects: Naps of Cabase and Argentina Conectada.”
Internet Pampeana. Another participant of the debate was Maria Marta Cortesini Ramos, Communication Manager of Aguas del Colorado Sapem, State company from the province of La Pampa, that in 2005 started the project Internet Pampeana. Today, it has 1800 kilometers of fiber optic, covering the 90% of the province. The plan also expects the integration of all ISPs and cooperatives of the area to the network, thus providing a cheaper connectivity. In this sense, the experience of Cooperativa de Lujan, integrated to Coopenet, was also presented. Pablo Fernandez, responsible of ISP of the entity, explained that the six first users of fiber optic to home network were connected by the cooperative.
Together with this development, they have already requested the license to Afsca in order to provide pay television service, and they have started the proceedings so as to get the authorization to provide telephony and triple play.
Interest in costs. Later on, the attendees had the chance to make questions to the representative of Arsat. The mostly questioned matters were related to the possible costs imposed for the ISPs willing to buy capacity from the State company and to the situation of the works. Additionally, Pesado was suggested that the company should open other information channels in order to learn about the status of the biddings and the development of the fiber optic laying.