The CEO of the American Samoa Telecommunications Authority, Lewis Wolman, has held discussions with representatives from Hawaiki Cable, OPT French Polynesia, Samoa and the Cook Islands about the future connectivity options in this part of the South Pacific.
The talks were also part of research for options that directly affect American Samoa.
According to Wolman, “We are all trying to understand how our countries can benefit from the development of the Manatua Cable due to be launched in 2020, the Hawaiki Cable and the Tui Samoa Cable.”
There’s another cable on the horizon called the Southern Cross next cable.
Wolman told KHJ News the aim of the discussions was to clarify the challenges, opportunities and possible developments in the region so that major decisions can be made in the future.
Here at home, the Hawaiki Cable and BLAST Broadband are fully utilizable now by ASTCA’s Internet customers.
However, according to Wolman, they have not migrated all of their customers to the new higher speed service yet. He said, “We will do that migration in the next few months.”
He also pointed out that the new Hawaiki capacity will not be fully utilizable by ASTCA mobile phone customers until the authority launches the new SIM-card-based LTE+ network in a few months.
“The nature of telecom is that upgrades are being put in place continually,” said the CEO.
Asked about ASTCA’s TV service, one of the touted benefits of the Hawaiki Cable, Wolman said this will be launched later this year when they’ve finished negotiations with content providers and prepared their TV product.
This includes pricing, billing and marketing.
