Worldcall Wireless in Karachi

Worldcall has banners up in various parts of the city announcing the availability of their wireless local loop service which was anticipated since May 2007. The advertisements say free local call, free nationwide calls (presumably on their own network), 85 paisa per minute to US/UK and 10 paisa/min for WLL based Internet. The service is running off Huawei’s equipment.

CDMA based WLL services have already seen earlier players like Telecard and PTCL and have drawn a mixed response in terms of service standard quality. The ‘free on-net’ calling phenomenon which was triggered by Telecard (and is now being followed by Worldcall too) has found some loyal subscribers. I regularly spot shop owners in various localities of the city keeping a ‘Go CDMA’ phone as part of their communication arsenal and most of the time, the end user is doing the ‘least cost routing’ – finding the service that provides the cheapest service to reach the particular end number.

However, with a very high/healthy tele-density that is regularly being cited in anything good is to be said about Pakistan and a stiff competition and friction between DSL providers, it looks like that Worldcall as a late entrant in this digital communication race in Karachi would be having a tough time at best.

Performance of the reported availability of EvDO services on this network would be worth observing. If you have a review of the service, please post it in the comments.