Manama, Kingdom of Bahrain – Sunday 3 July 2011
The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) has released its first mobile quality of service report for the Kingdom of Bahrain. The audit which was performed by Directique, an independent consulting firm during October 2010 identified that all three mobile operator, Batelco, Viva and Zain were achieving good performances compared with benchmarked mobile operators in other markets including UAE, France and Germany. The evaluation included the following mobile services: voice, sms & mms, email and data services over computer and smartphone; and was performed with a
method designed to gather a faithful qualitative record of the end user’s point of view.
This quality of service report follow and complement a mobile coverage audit published by TRA last month. The coverage audit was conducted to verify that all three mobile operators did comply with their mobile license obligation to provide mobile coverage to 95% of the population in the Kingdom; the audit confirmed that Operators comply in fact exceed their license obligation by offering near to 100% outdoor population coverage based on 87,683 individual test calls.
Commenting on those reports TRA’s Technical and Operations Director Mr. Mohammed Mahmood said “The result of the audits is clearly indicating that mobile operators are putting a lot of efforts not only to comply with their license conditions but also to provide consumers with state of the art mobile
services and satisfy their needs. TRA can be satisfied that consumers are enjoying a wide range of mobile telecommunications services with good levels of coverage and quality TRA will continue to closely monitor the evolution of the Mobile QoS. »
The availability of quality mobile telecommunications services are critical elements for the success of the Kingdom of Bahrain. Mobile services have seen a succession of different technologies which have enabled mobile services to evolve from basic voice and message services to more recently
multimedia services including email, access to the internet and the conveyance of real time video. The common factor is the evolution of mobility towards higher data speeds, initially available only through
fixed services.
Today’s mobile telecommunications services allow many different economic and social sectors to benefit from enhanced applications and services. For the younger population, this translates to easy contact, music and inter-active games. Whilst in the business environment, the evolutions of mobile
services meant that many company executives initially and now many employees have access to secured company email and data while on the move allowing for flexibility, continuity and maintenance of response times.
To view the detailed mobile quality of service and coverage audit reports visit TRA website at www.tra.org.bh/market information/quality of service.
About TRA
Since its establishment in 2002 the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of the Kingdom of Bahrain (TRA) has been working with government, consumers, operators and investors to develop the Kingdom of Bahrain into the region’s most modern communications hub and to facilitate the growth of the market. As an exemplary Regulator for the region, TRA independently carries out its duties in a transparent and non-discriminatory manner. More information about TRA can be viewed at www.tra.org.bh
