Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 24, 2008 at 7:20 PM
Guest post by Naeem Pani Wala
When I decided to join advertising industry, 12 years back, I was criticized by many of my close friends. They thought it was a bubbling industry then, which may collapse any time. Even when I was in London for higher studies, the media analysts were not in favor of a media career in a country like Pakistan. Let me straight away come to the point and see if the situation has changed or not?
Although here in Karachi, the situation is not so bad as reported in Islamabad, where my friends are not contented at all with the current situation. Karachi as a hub of business and advertising is in a very strong position with over 50 advertising agencies from very big to very small ones (by small company I mean one room and even one man company handling just one client).
A year ago or so, advertising business was at boom with a race of claims of developments and prosperity. Those were the days of “Khushal Pakistan” campaign, with mega advertising budgets from the Musharraf backed government of PMLQ. This ‘Khushal Pakistan’ campaign fruited many of advertising companies which were close to the ruling party then. Especially in Punjab some special schemes were introduced to collect the funds for development, though these funds were never utilized and details are yet to be made public. So in short, people earned millions out of our national wealth. There are examples of those without a motorbike 10 years ago now own Mercedes. Continue Reading This Story
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 21, 2008 at 4:08 PM
Pakistan Telecommunication Authority has been advantaged to hold tax amount of Rs. 9,867,865,916, which is payable to FBR, until court concludes anything over the issue.
It may be recalled that Federal Board of Revenue had repeatedly asked Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to pay its due taxes, valuing Rs. 9.86 billion.
In response to FBR’s tax collection call, PTA took the matter in both High Court and Appellate Tribunals, and believed that PTA is not liable to pay any tax as it is authority itself.
While FBR’s official, who is managing the case from FBR’s side, told us that PTA is not paying its taxes for last 10 years, and this tax amount has reached almost Rs. 10 billion mark. It merits mentioning that PTA had paid Rs. 1 billion as an installment, but afterwords telecom authority is using delaying tactics to avoid paying taxes.
“Telecom authority is claiming exception which is not due at all; exemption from tax is not available to government authorities as it was withdrawn by virtue of overriding provision of section 54 of Income Tax Ordinance 2001”, added FBR’s official.
PTA’s spokesman was not available for the comment.
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 18, 2008 at 5:15 PM
We have been seeing Mobilink losing customers in recent months, hence the revenues too, resultantly; the impact can be felt on overall performance of Orascom, the parent company of Mobilink.
Recently, Orascom Telecom (OTH) reported its 3rd quarter, 2008 profit of US$ 90.5 million - down by 28% compared to same period last year – while revenues reached US$1.37 billion in Q3 2008. Mobilink’s subscribers reached 31,359,049 mark out of 79,267,452 Orascom subscribers in 6 regions.
Mobilink reported ARPU of 2.9 $, lesser as compared to 3.9 $, same period last year. The decrease in ARPU in Pakistan is mainly due to the decreasing value of Pakistani Rupee against the US Dollar as well as rising inflation and an increase in sales tax which has further impacted consumers’ spends. Continue Reading This Story
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 14, 2008 at 9:20 AM
All cellular companies, except Ufone, have collectively asked the government to reduce taxes on telecom services. In a collective letter, mobile phone companies have mentioned the government to reconsider increased GST, taxes on handsets and removal of SIM activation tax.
This was carried away after a significant decline in revenues and increased operational expenses of cellular companies. However, cellular companies are still awaiting any positive response from the government regarding this. Continue Reading This Story
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Posted by: Muhammad Ali Raza on November 10, 2008 at 12:01 PM
Cyber Crime law, that re-emerged few days back, in shape of presidential order (despite, there is a parliament available, I am unable to comprehend what urgency was there that President had to put forward this ordinance, anyway, its not part of our discussion), we need to fully understand this law. Because, it can be really very crucial for us, as the law have all the capabilities for trapping any one of us.
There are certain discussions going on over the technology forums, where Gurus are pointing out several aspects of cyber crime law, similarly, I wanted to put forward my opinion and observations as well.
The first thing after going through the draft of this ordinance, is that it is largely un-practicable – due to incompetence of our law enforcement agencies, and overall judicial structure. There are good chances, that lawyers never ever carried away any training or courses for getting familiar with internet and computer related criminal procedures.
Government of UAE can be taken as a good example, for instance, they never make anything a law until they can’t implement it. Because, making a law without any implementation or without availing the technology to get the rules implemented, just introducing a law makes no sense at all. Continue Reading This Story
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 10, 2008 at 8:19 AM
Believe me, Pakistan’s Government is lot better than of many other states. At least we have got the liberty of using many mediums for our communications, unlike Iran, that has banned SMS service on all cell phones, throughout the country.
(NCR Iran) National Council of Resistance of Iran has reported that Organization of Communications Regulations has putout new laws imposing restrictions on sending SMS. For a typical cell owner, he has to go through security checks by the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) to receive clearance for using the service – otherwise, no one will be able to send/receive SMS.
I purposefully praised Pakistan’s government, so govt chaps are not convinced to follow Iran here - as govt is fully geared this days, and we can expect them doing anything.
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on November 7, 2008 at 5:16 AM
This news report that appeared in “Daily Times” today (November 7th, 2008) - appears to be another interesting outcome of Government; as this “Prevention of Electronic Crimes Ordinance” is effective from September 29, however, the government just got late in announcing it.
Don’t get worried, my readers, In fact this story is not for everyone, because it says death penalties to those only, who are involved in Terrorism act, being carried away through computers and internet. Furthermore, death penalty is limited to an offense that ‘Causes death of any person’. Continue Reading This Story
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on October 27, 2008 at 2:42 AM
We had covered this Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) market review few months ago, however, changes take place in days now. As the energy crisis continue in Pakistan, in fact it has gone worse, people are again rushing towards UPS markets to get themselves electricity backups.
Thanks to winter, general people may not require UPS units as they did in hot summer, but businesses, students, and those who want to remain in tact with their electrical devices are in crucial situation due to unannounced and long run power failures.
Okay, I am covering only UPS market review, hopefully I will bring forward Generators’ market review as well in coming days, but lets focus on options and prices for UPS units in this article.
We saw two very significant things, one that UPS market is undergoing tremendous rush, and same is the case with prices. By the way, these prices went down in month of Ramadan (as there were no power outages then), but once again UPS businesses have gone high.
We noted that average cost of a Rs. 10,000 UPS has increased by almost 30 percent when compared to prices in May-June 2008. Retailers say this increment is due to the fact that manufacturers have increased prices of raw material on pretext of higher production cost due to higher imports of accessories.
A survey of retailers unveiled that UPS with a capacity of running two fans and two lights is hot item, and its sale has gone as high as 30 percent. It merits mentioning that this is least powered UPS available in the market, and is mostly used by small to mid sized shopkeepers and home users.
It merits mentioning here that there are two types of UPS available, imported ones and locally assembled. Retailers said that buyers prefer locally made UPS units for two reasons. 1 – They are inexpensive, 2 – Imported UPS units come with no warranty, hence more risk for buyers.
As the demand is increasing, there are more people getting involved in making of these local made UPS units. This retailer named, Hafiz Imran confirmed that there are tens of UPS manufacturing plants working in Rawalpindi. By the way, Daily Time lately reported that there are around 45 manufacturing units of UPS are working in the different parts of the Karachi only as cottage industry. The wholesalers have doubled their orders in order to meet the growing demand.
It was also reported that there comes lots bugs and after sale complains due to ordinary quality and unqualified technicians who make these UPS units in lesser time.
With UPS units, there come batteries, which are used with UPS units to keep your electrical devices alive – and scenario is not different of batteries as well, as prices have gone high here too.
So this is what the market has been undergoing, now check out these tips that you must consider before buying a UPS
Things to consider for Buying a UPS
- Try to put minimum load on UPS, that is don’t try to put all electrical devices on your UPS, instead make sure that only power critical devices are on UPS
- Once you have decided what items you will be running on UPS, calculate their power load. For this, don’t rely on UPS shops, instead ask for electrician in your colony and let him calculate the power load that you will be running on UPS. For instance, a computer with 17 inch monitor is likely to require 400 to 450 watts. Similarly, calculate your entire load and make sure what power do you require from this UPS.
- Go into main electrical markets of your city, instead of your corner electrical shop. Check around in couple of shops for the rates for the power your need. Let’s assume you need a UPS of 1000 Watts, then ask around what quotes you get.
- Please note that there are NO OFFICIAL RATES, so you will have to do little research to save you couple of thousand Rupees
- Please make sure that battery is nothing to do with your UPS. Your batteries will be responsible for backup time. So if you purchase a low ampere battery, it will give you lesser time and vice versa.
- Once your UPS is ready, make sure that it is giving output of exactly what you had asked for. For this purpose you can keep along your cousin or friend who knows a little about electrical meters, ask retailer (shopkeeper) to verify that this UPS is giving out proper voltages.
- If you are planning to use computer with this UPS, make sure that UPS unit supports it. For this direct the shopkeeper to make it computer complaint. (They make little configuration changes in your UPS, which prevents your Computer rebooting when electricity goes down.
Prices for UPS Units with Built in Dry Batteries
These UPS units come with built in Dry Batteries, and stabilizers. Means you get a once pack solution and simply take it home. But make sure that back-up duration for Buil in Dry Batteries’ UPS units is between 10 to 15 minutes only - Meaning that these are mainly for computers and for just saving your files and allowing you enough time to shut down your computer. (In case you need more backup time, then check for below given UPS prices that come without Batteries – and you can add up batteries to get more back up time)
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