BBC News: Superfast broadband may help make Qatar new tech hub
Channel: Ministry Of Transport - MOT
Date: 2011-07-18

BBC REPORT :

The beach at al-Khor is no place for holiday makers.
The landscape is barren, and a burning wind whips up sand into a dust storm that hits you at well over 40 degrees.
But this rather uninviting patch of shoreline is actually the scene for something of a technological revolution.
Because it is here where Qatar's brand new fibre optic cable emerges from the waters of the Gulf and comes to shore, before being beamed out to homes and businesses across the country.
The cable will give consumers here eye-watering connection speeds that may eventually reach 10G per second - hundreds of times faster than the rather paltry speeds on offer today.
In short, Qatar is about to join the digital Premier League.
Fabulously rich
Like many Gulf states, Qatar is a country in transition.
Thanks to huge gas reserves, it has grown fabulously rich, but the government wants to diversify and build a knowledge-based economy instead.
So Qatar is ploughing billions into investing in education and research, and no more so than in the field of technology.
But the government knows that to compete with other heavyweights around the world, it needs an information superhighway.
The cable will go live in September, and excitement is already building.
"This is the last piece of the puzzle," says Khalifa Haroon, one of Qatar's most well-known web entrepreneurs and founder of the popular website ILoveQatar.net.
"Arabs are very social people. We love to go onto social websites. We love the latest technology and we carry multiple devices, so it seems natural that we need super-fast internet - and that's exactly what we're going to get."
Qataris are notorious for their love of gadgets.
Any self-respecting young Qatari will carry at least two mobile phones - often three - and, with a GDP per capita of more than $100,000, locals can afford to upgrade pretty much whenever they want. 
And although internet speeds in the country are notoriously slow, seven out of 10 people are already hooked up to broadband.
The government now wants to increase this even further, and is currently installing a nationwide "Fibre To The Home" network.
Read More: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-13667229

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