- Telecom Commission plans 3G policy (13 July 2008)
Minister of Communications and Information Technology, Shri A Raja announced that the Telecom Commission would deliberate on the 3G-spectrum auction guidelines formulated by the Department and will rule out the policies in the next two weeks.
Shri Raza has already got the Prime Minister's approval to go ahead with 3G-spectrum auction and is expected to fetch good revenues to the exchequer. The 3G-spectrum auction is likely to see many foreign players' participation in the bids this time.
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TRAI, DoT ends feud on 3G, WiMAX reserve price (12 July 2008)
The long-drawn feud between the Ministry of Communications and telecom regulator TRAI over the Third-Generation (3G) mobile services policy has come to an end. TRAI has decided to approve the Department of Telecom’s plan to double the reserve price for pan-India 3G-spectrum auction to US$525.5 million.
TRAI also cleared DoT’s proposal to hike the reserve price for Pan-India Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) spectrum, known as WiMAX, to around US$ 1.9 billion. This implies that a telco bidding for both 3G and WiMAX spectrum on a pan-India basis will have to shell out a minimum price or reserve price of around US$ 6.9 billion.
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RCOM extended merger talks with MTN (10 July 2008)
Mr. Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications (RCOM) extended its 45-day exclusive merger talks with South African telco MTN till July 21. This clearly indicates that it is trying to arrive at a deal that would remain insulated from the rivalry between the Ambani brothers. MTN and RCOM began negotiations on May 26 after Bharti Airtel walked out of talks with MTN.
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Idea acquires 41 pc in Spice Comm (9 July 2008)
Aditya Birla Group firm Idea Cellular announced that it has acquired about 41 % stake in Spice Communications through open market and block trade transactions. Idea Cellular has acquired 20 lakh equity shares, representing 0.29 % in Spice Communications through open market transactions. Besides, the company has acquired over 28.14 crore-equity shares, representing 40.80 %, through block trade.
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Satyam in alliance with Tyfone for mobile financial services (7 July 2008)
Satyam Computers announced its alliance with Tyfone for providing mobile financial services. The experience of Satyam and system integration expertise along with Tyfone's complete mobile financial services infrastructure would provide better solutions and technology.
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US firm Aryty to bring overseas-prepaid phone credit service to India (6 July 2008)
US firm Aryty, a subsidiary of long distance telephony operator Gorilla Mobile, is all set to launch its overseas prepaid phone credit service in India that would allow anyone living in the US or Canada to remit mobile minutes to their kin back home.
Currently the service is available in the US and Canada to send load or minutes credit to any phone in Philippines and is now being extended to India. According to Aryty Vice President (India & Middle East) Mr. Harbinder S Narula, the company is in talks with Indian telecom operators to start the service on a pan-India scale.
Aryty is also looking at entering the Value-Added Service segment in the country as it would offer ring tones, music, and other mobile gifts through its website for the Indian customer.
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Reports says, India will be the largest market for WiMAX by 2012 (4 July 2008)
A report by IT market research firm Springboard research says that India will be the largest market for WiMax in the Asia-pacific region by 2012, with an estimated market share of 35.7 % in terms of revenue and 15.8 million subscribers.
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Nu Tek plans to invest Rs 20 cr for acquisitions (
4 July 2008)
Gurgaon-based telecom infrastructure service provider Nu Tek India plans to invest US$ 4.6 billion for acquisition of companies operating in a similar space in the overseas market. The company intends to increase their presence in new areas by acquiring companies. With this aim, Nu Tek has identified a few US companies with operations in the Middle East and North Africa to deal with.