“We are small, remote but among the best – and there is more to come! Our target is it to be the best in the world of telecommunication in near future!” Says Jan Ziskasen, CEO of Faroese Telekom and facts prove his confidence!
To be connected is very important for a group of remote islands like the Faroe Islands. That is on one side to be connected with each other: every single household – even on the most remote places of the islands – is connected by broadband and 90 % of all households run at a speed of 50 Mb/s – which is above global average speed (45 mbps). There are two providers on the market competing for the business and consumer segments.
Some rankings you might come across can be confusing – as the Faroe Islands are an autonomous country within Denmark, they do not show as a separate nation in most of the international rankings – they are too small to register.
The mobile coverage on all the islands is at 100 % for populated areas and roads and 95 % of any geographic terrain. Mobile coverage already is the best in the world! It is available even in the deep-sea tunnels, connecting some of the islands and on sea up to 120 km distance. Even the football stadium in Torshavn, the Tórsvøllur, is equipped with strong reception and can be modified for mass streaming anytime, if big events are coming up.
If you are interested in some more details please see https://www.faroeislands.fo/people-society/infrastructure/communication-infrastructure/
But: a top-level connectivity is not only important on and within the islands. For business and innovation it is of utmost importance to be connected to related communities around the world. Just look at the story of how communication developed on the islands!
It is just 112 years ago that the telegraph cable came ashore in Tórshavn, connecting Shetland Islands with the Faroe Islands and onwards to Iceland – now it was possible to communicate with the world using communication technology rather than ships.
Since then it has been a lot of hard work and dedication to build the necessary cable infrastructure necessary for a world-class connectivity! From first copper cables for telephony until 1993, as the internet became commercialized. Faroese Telecom provided oil platforms West of Shetland with internet in 2007, oil terminals (which are the depots for oil or petrochemical products) in Shetland and Orkney and connected a floating production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO) West of Shetland (Glen Lyon). The company’s experience to work in a rough and remote environment surrounded by sea provides them with a competitive edge in finding solutions in the North Sea area.
The cable equipment started with CANTAT-3 (CANadian Trans ATlantic cable) in 1993, then fiber as backbone and finally 10 years later in 2003 the first submarine communications cable gave the islands the necessary redundancy. Additional infrastructure followed – all of these are huge and ambitious projects undertaken by the Faroe Islands.
Now, in liaison with the Chinese ICT giant Huawei, Faroese Telecom has implemented the latest 4,5G LTE technology to cover every inch of the Faroe Islands, staking claim on world leadership in mobile connectivity with average speeds rapidly approaching 100 Mbps. And the Faroe Islands is now also on-route to 5G, participating on the Scottish Isles in a 5G pilot project funded by the British Government. True 5G is expected in the Faroe Islands in 2020.
Already with the 4.5G technology Faroese Telecom are approaching what is called GIGA speed. In labs 960 mbps (0.96 gbps) were reached – these are extreme speeds and these high speeds are beyond what normal mobile devices are capable of.
And why all this speed and huge capacity is necessary? Because there will be millions of things, connected in the internet and needing a capacity beyond our present imagination to function real-time and parallel! This all is basis for the internet-of-things of the future!
Another one of the company’s latest projects is an Arctic Satellite communication – Faroe Telecom are now also looking into space! Working with the Danish Defense, Danish Space Institute, European Space Agency, and Icelandic and Greenlandic Telco’s on sending two satellites into orbit covering the arctic footprint.
The Faroe Islands are very small but there is no need for small nations to limit themselves.
In the new world with disruptions happening all the time it is possible to aim at being number ONE, and that is what the Faroe Islands are doing across many areas – not just in telecommunications!
Jan Ziskasen is the CEO of Faroese Telecom since 2015. He has an interesting leadership philosophy which is to transform people’s lives and it is therefore important for him that every action, conversation and decision is heading in that direction. There are seven key leadership categories that govern how he leads:
– building organizations that function without the leader [clock builder]
– continue to grow as a leader and bringing others along [continuous growth]
– fast decision making and where needed with appropriate risk [pace]
– always being there for people and yet have plenty of time [caring]
– being a deliberate and intentional communicator [communication]
– leading with the head and the heart [completeness]
– being diligent and dedicated in every area [passion to win]
tmf dialogue marketing – We point out the areas in which the Faroe Islands have excellent business expertise – to connect with similar projects or knowledge clusters around the world. We want the world to come to the Faroe Islands and network on all projects that are introduced here – for more check https://www.tmf-dialogue.net/category/smart-congress
