Mr Robert Ordanoski

A real case study on a nationwide broadband rollout, with real numbers to show for it, real players in the market, and an active regulator in the form of the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore driving the initiative – this was one of the topics that caught the interest of Mr Robert Ordanoski, Director of Macedonia Agency for Electronic Communications, at the 6th Telecom Regulatory Course, which was held at IDA from 3 to 7 September 2012.

Mr Ordanoski was one of 26 participants from 13 countries who took part in the executive programme on “Enabling Framework for ICT Development – The Singapore Experience”. The course covered topics such as the Singapore’s overall policy, regulatory, and competition management framework, spectrum and resource management issues, telecom licensing framework, interconnection, and infrastructure sharing, and new developments such as the Next Generation Nationwide Broadband Network and its regulatory issues.

Impressed with Singapore’s Next Generation Nationwide Broadband Network, Mr Ordanoski said “In our case, the idea is is still in our heads, we are still discussing with the government, the players and operators in the market, on what models should we use to introduce the broadband nationwide in our country? Here (in this course) we found a real case study with real figures and real players in the market; we have seen the role of IDA; and I am pretty confident that we will use many of these strategies in our case.”

Mr Louis Napoleon C. Casambre

Besides presentations by IDA officials, the course also featured sharing sessions by telecommunications operators SingTel and StarHub, which gave participants the operators’ views on the ICT regulatory and business environment in Singapore. The programme also included site visits to IDA’s Spectrum Monitoring Centre at Tele Tech Park, and the iExperience Centre, where participants experienced the potential of Next Generation Network Services.

The greatest takeaway for Mr Ordanoski was being able to listen to real practitioners sharing their experiences. The course provided participants with insights from various perspectives such as that of the International Telecommunications Union and the telcos, in addition to the regulators. “I don’t prefer the academic conferences where we just discuss the theory,” he said.

For Mr Louis Napoleon C. Casambre, Executive Director of the Information and Communications Technology Office, in the Department of Science and Technology of the Republic of the Philippines, the course helped him to gain a better understanding of the issues involved in telecom regulations. “The Singapore experience shows what can be achieved by a well-thought out, well implemented policy environment,” he said.

Mrs Irene Kaggwa Sewankambo

Mr Casambre, who oversees leveraging ICT as a tool for economic and social development in his country, said although he understands the technologies driving the telecoms industry, he hopes to understand the social and governance aspects better. “I think being able to attend this will help me go a long way in my work,” he said.

Another participant, Mrs Irene Kaggwa Sewankambo, Acting Assistant Director of Licensing & Standards at the Uganda Communications Commission, attended the course because it covered many topics which her country was currently dealing with.

“In my line of work, I had a number of challenging issues that involved dealing with quality of service, licensing and the performance bond framework. Although there is a lot of information on the web, there were still many grey areas which were not mentioned in detail, so when the opportunity came up to attend the course, I looked at the programme and found that it actually covered many of the subjects I was interested in,” she said.

Mr Hilal Omar Mohammed Al Siyabi

“I had been wondering how Singapore managed these issues for so long, and with so much success. Now I can get first-hand information directly from the people involved. The course has helped me understand IDA’s approach to regulation and fill in the gaps for many of the challenges that we are facing in the Uganda Communication Commission.”

Mr Hilal Omar Mohammed Al Siyabi, Manager of Media & Consumer Affairs at the Oman Telecommunications Regulatory Authority agreed. “Even though I have attended some regulatory classes before, this is a unique course because IDA’s approach is excellent. They allow practitioners, and experts from the field to teach the course. In addition to the interaction and content that we received from the lecturers, there was also a golden opportunity to meet other people in the field as well, not only from IDA and also from other countries such as Africa, India, Thailand, , Cambodia and Macedonia. The diversity of the group provided a good learning environment, and the course exceeded my expectations,” he said.

IDA has been conducting the annual Telecom Regulatory Course since 2007, for countries that are keen to use ICT to further their social and economic growth. Targeted at senior ICT policy-makers and telecoms regulators, the programme has attracted more than 130 officials from over 28 countries since its inception.