BusinessWire reports: Callmate Telips, Pakistan’s first private Long Distance and International (LDI) operator is interconnecting with iBasis for international voice services.
iBasis is a wholesale carrier of LDI whose customers include AT&T, Skype, China Mobile, Sprint and MCI among others.
As of Nov 2003, Pakistan had only 4 million fixed phone lines with a population of over 150 million. India in contrast had 43.91 fixed line users as of Oct 2004 and 43.90 mobile users on the same date which previously doubled in 2002-2003 and doubled again in 2003-2004.
This will give PTCL some more competition for the ~160 million Pakistanis. We previously reported mobile phone carriers crossing the 10 million mark and PTCL targetting 2 million additional users in 2005.