Stabroek Business has learnt that four local companies have been named in the recently completed draft telecommunications Bill 2010 as entities that will be licensed to provide services under the deregulated telecommunications regime once the Act is passed into law.
The four companies named in the document are E-Networks, Quark Communication, I-Net and Nexlink Communication. Once the draft legislation is passed in the National Assembly the four named companies will be licensed to join the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T) and Digicel as telecommunications service providers to Guyana.
So far the heads of both of the current service providers have confirmed that they have received the document from Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon. Stabroek Business had learnt that that the two companies were given just over two weeks to study the document.
Stabroek Business has sought without success to secure substantive comments from the heads of both GT&T and Digicel on the contents of the draft legislation. But both Yog Mahadeo and Gregory Deane, the respective chief executive officers of the two companies declined to comment beyond acknowledging that they had been sent copies of the draft legislation.
Asked earlier this week whether he could confirm that the four companies in this Stabroek Business story had been named in the legislation as operators who would be licensed to join GT&T and Digicel in providing telecommunications services Mahadeo again declined to comment on “anything that had to do with the content of the new draft legislation at this time.”
Reportedly owned by a relative of a prominent member of the ruling PPP/C, E-Networks Inc has been in operation since 2004. The company’s clients include large corporations, small businesses and residential users.
It is reportedly the only company in Guyana offering tripleway services (digital television, voice and internet access over a single physical connection).
Quark Communications Inc is owned by Guyanese Brian Young and its business address is listed as 21218 Saint Andrews Blvd # 219 Boca Raton, FL 33433.
The company was incorporated on February 05, 2008 in Florida.
Both Nexlink and I-Net Com-munications are Georgetown-based businesses owned by Guyanese.
The former is believed to have been set up just prior to the completion of the new draft legislation and reportedly provides a broadband service covering a radius of 10 miles from Georgetown. Nexlink says it employs the latest in wireless networking technology.
Stabroek Business has learnt that not only will the four named companies, along with GT&T and Digicel enjoy the use of the spectrum without the need for any application for their licences but that they will also enjoy freedom from any regulation imposed by the Public Utilities Commission.
