MTN HSDPA: 14Mbps could be a reality

Thats quite an acronym for a post title. I do apologize.

MTN: South African Mobile Telephone Network Provider, HSPDA: The new form of internet connecitvity avaliable through some mobile networks, 14Mbps: A very fast internet connection.

There has been much talk about the new HSPDA service avaliable from Vodacom. Vodacom boasts speeds of up to 1.8mb/s. For all you foreigners, in South Africa thats pretty fast, quite a bit faster than our ADSL (our broadband internet) options. Sad, but true.

The beauty of HSPDA though, is that unlike wireless internet providers, like iBurst, you are connected anywhere you have cellphone signal. You are by no means restricted to the limited reception areas of wireless internet providers. See Techblog for a good example of the benefits of Vodacom HSDPA.

Its only a matter of time before MTN’s HSDPA service becomes a strong competitor to Vodacom.

Seligmann, MTN data and messaging senior manager, says to ITWeb that “although HSDPA was only rolled out last month, MTN has many plans to upgrade the network in various stages over the next two years.

“The upgrade process for HSDPA is to take downlink speeds to 3.6Mbps, then 7.2Mbps, and then to 14.4Mbps,” he says.”

It looks like the future of internet connectivity in South Africa is starting to look a bit brighter. HSDPA is costly, and it’s going to take a bit of time to tweak, no doubt about that, but hopefully soon internet connectivity will be fast, completely mobile and affordable.

Link courtesy of Grouchy Blogger