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Gamar establishes VSAT network
Gamar Telecommunications has established the largest VSAT network in the Middle East. The network allows the Arab News group to publish its titles throughout the GCC and Egypt via a satellite that broadcasts data from the Indian Ocean region.
"This is the first network to be allowed to broadcast digital links at up to 512 Kbits/s to multiple printing sites in the region," Shafique Azam, managing director of Gamar Telecommunications, exclusively told CommsMEA in London.
The multi-million dollar network allows the Saudi Arabian publisher to transmit daily their newspaper from Arab Press House in London to Goonhilly Earth Station, some 300 miles away. From there, the satellite beams data to all the printing sites within its footprint. This enables the entire broadsheet to be transmitted in less than an hour.
"It was difficult at times to establish such a complex network. It was the first of its kind and covered more than one country" continued Azam. "However, it does show that if one plans well and approaches such projects with determination and is able to explain the technology and its benefits to the most important senior decision makers in the region, then anything is possible."
Previously, Arab News transmitted its publications to each site via PSTN lines, transmitting at 14.4 Kbits/s, sometimes taking up to eight hours to transmit the entire paper to each separate site. This was not only time-consuming, but occasionally the telephone line quality would be so poor to some locations that the newspaper was sometimes not published in time to hit the news stands in the morning. This resulted in the loss of millions of dollars in advertising revenue every year.
The contract builds on a similar VSAT network that Azam established for Arab News in Europe whilst regional manager for BT, but is designed with a much higher degree of resilience and contingency planning due to the harsh desert climate. The VSAT terminals range in size from 3.5 to 5 meters, and were manufactured from spun aluminium to allow reception of very low bit error data rate.
- CommsMEA
Published April 1999
