Bermuda Internet
and E-Commerce Facilities
The
main telecoms providers in Bermuda have
opened e-commerce support centres which
provide hosting services.
TeleBermuda
International opened its centre in December,
1999. The TBI centre is staffed 24/7, and
provides secure website hosting services
for companies wanting to conduct e-commerce
from Bermuda; Cable & Wireless shortly
afterwards opened its sixth world-wide 'platform'
offering web-hosting, e-commerce and other
Internet services in Devonshire, Bermuda
- the other five centres are in London,
Washington, Bahrein, Sydney and Hong Kong.
There
are a number of other local Internet Service
Providers offering varying levels of support
to offshore businesses. 'Partial hosting'
involves the provision of payment pages
on secure facilities in Bermuda, saving
the expense of purchasing and maintaining
a secure server, routers, firewalls, and
transaction gateway. 'Total hosting' involves
the supply of secure facilities to co-locate
a client’s own technology solutions,
or provision of a complete e-commerce package
including access to the Internet and transaction
processing. Local providers can also assist
with the procurement, importation, and installation
of client hardware.
Several
of the e-commerce service providers rent
“electronic stores” to allow digital
businesses to operate from Bermuda without
incorporating a company on the island. Each
“electronic store” has separate
assets and liabilities, as well as separate
bank accounts, and must operate under the
terms of a user agreement.
Long-distance
call costs in Bermuda have fallen substantially
in recent years.
The
Bermuda government is also in the process
of fully implementing a new regime for Internet
telephony and broad-band services.
In
April 2007, Cable & Wireless Bermuda
Limited announced a US$22 million investment
in a next generation fibre optic cable and
associated infrastructure over two years,
which promises to enhance the telecoms services
it provides to Bermuda's international business
community. The investment includes a new
800-mile long cable linking Bermuda to the
United States. The cable, which was due
to be operational in October 2007, has 700
times more capacity than the PTAT-1 cable
it replaces and will provide Cable &
Wireless Bermuda and Quantum Communications
Limited customers access to the Cable &
Wireless global network.
"The
new undersea cable will satisfy the growing
demand for diverse, reliable high-speed
data and broadband services, which cannot
be provided by the restricted capacity of
the current cable," commented Eddie
Saints, Chief Executive of Cable & Wireless
Bermuda during the Bermuda International
Business Association annual forum in London.
"This
investment will also enable us to provide
direct international access to all three
diverse fibre optic cable systems serving
Bermuda from our Teleport facility in Devonshire
parish on Main Island, benefiting Bermuda's
international business and residential community,"
he added.
According
to a 2008 study the overall adoption rate
of Internet services in Bermuda continues
to be high. Almost all firms (95%) have
internet access with a high-speed connection,
however T1 lines or greater accounted for
just 18%. 58% of employees are considered
to be competent or skilled at using computers,
up 5% from last year. Corporate cell phone
and mobile device ownership continued to
show an increase this year from 75% to 85%.
Companies tended to own more mobile devices
in 2008, from 49% in 2007 to 63%.
90%
of Bermudan households own a computer, up
from 87% in 2007. The vast majority (84%)
of households access the internet, and consistent
with last year’s results, out of those
that have internet access 81% have a high
speed internet connection (DSL, Cable or
wireless). In 2008, 94% of Bermudan households
own a cell phone and this year, residents
owned a larger proportion of mobile devices
such as BlackBerries, increasing from 16%
in 2007 to 32%.
Regarding
residents’ online habits, consistent
with 2007, the most regularly used online
activities include using search engines,
looking for travel information, and researching
products or services and online shopping.
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