EgyptEgypt plans to sell 10 percent of Telecom Egypt, its fixed-line telecommunications monopoly, in June. The aim of the partial privatization is to reduce red tape and improve competitiveness, the government said. The government will then wait before continuing with the privatization. The sale...
KPN Telecom is said to be in discussions with Spain's Telefonica regarding a possible US$54 billion merger. At press time, international reports said the companies had agreed in principle to a deal that would evenly split control of the two entities. Such a merger...
South Korean mobile phone carrier Hansol M.com said talks to sell a controlling stake in the company to either Korea Telecom or the LG Group had broken down. The problems centered around differences over prices, according to press reports.Both Korea Telecom and the LG...
TOKYO-J-Phone Group, Japan's second-largest mobile phone company, plans to merge its nine member firms into three companies later this year. The announcement follows the company's application for a third-generation license to the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications earlier this month.The move is aimed at...
GENEVA-Despite the best efforts of International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Secretary General Yoshio Utsumi, the reform process designed to drag the 135-year-old telecommunications standardization body into the 21st century has once again bogged down. Delegates to the Working Group on ITU Reform's (WGR) April meeting...
TOKYO-In early February, some 300 telecom experts from 25 nations in the Asia-Pacific region met in Tokyo to compile their proposals for WRC-2000. Based on the five-day meeting, the Asia Pacific Telecommunity Conference Preparatory Group (APG) plans to submit a proposal at WRC-2000 for...
GENEVA-With auction prices of the United Kingdom's five third-generation licenses beating even the most inflated analyst forecasts, all eyes are now on Italy, which is set to allocate five 15-year Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) licenses in a few months.Europe's largest mobile market with...
BEIJING-China agreed in its negotiations with the United States for entry to the World Trade Organization (WTO) that foreign operators would be allowed a maximum 49-percent stake in mobile telephone joint ventures by 2005. The European Union is aiming for a foreign majority of...
DENVER, United States-The United States' official position going into the World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC) supports designating three frequency bands-1710 MHz to 1885 MHz, 2500 MHz to 2690 MHz and 698 MHz to 960 MHz-from which to allocate additional third-generation spectrum for terrestrial services. It...
SAO PAULO, Brazil-In early January, by starting operations as a "mirror" company of fixed-line carriers Telefonica and Telemar, Vesper faced a challenge in the Brazilian market. The company planned to compete with operators installed in 17 states, with an objective of ending the first...
GENEVA-As WRC-2000 delegates prepare to pack their bags and head off for four grueling weeks of debates and technical deliberations in Istanbul, Turkey, Europe's Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) lobby is gearing up for a battle to secure the right to additional third-generation (3G)...
The U.K. auction brought in a resounding 22.5 billion (US$35.45 billion), far exceeding predictions prior to the auction's start. The question now is whether these prices are based on a sound business case or the most optimistic scenarios for the development of the 3G...
A consortium comprised of Telefonica, Orange and Sonera will join U.S.-based MCI WorldCom and 10 other groups in bidding for third-generation (3G) licenses in Germany. The auction is set to begin in early July.The German regulator will sell 12 frequencies of radio spectrum to...
FinlandPriority Wireless, a unit of United Pan-Europe Communications, said it won a license to implement a wireless local loop system in Finland. The 26 GHz license covers the nine most populous areas of Finland, including Helsinki. Priority Wireless plans to begin rolling out the...
DENVER, United States-The CDMA Development Group said it expects handset makers to introduce commercial CDMA handsets with subscriber identity modules by the end of the year to allow global roaming.The CDG announced late last month that the Telecommunications Industry Association will approve the CDMA...
DENVER, United States- BellSouth and SBC Communications finally ended weeks of speculation, announcing plans to create a wireless joint venture that will become the second-largest wireless operator in the United States, serving 16.2 million subscribers and reaching 175 million potential customers.And, with the exception...
Great Aunt Agatha has never really come to terms with electricity. She keeps buying dummy plugs to insert into any unused electricity socket she can find. "If you leave the socket open, the electricity could leak out," she explains, "and electricity is dangerous."She also...
MOSCOW-Three nationwide Russian wireless carriers, which control close to 75 percent of the market, have launched a fierce battle for new clients as mobile phones become more common communications tools in Russia.Cellular phones are now ringing in buses, trolley buses and even subways. The...
SAO PAULO, Brazil-Anatel, Brazil's telecommunications regulatory agency, will not divulge the frequency band-either 1.8 GHz or 1.9 GHz-that band C cellular telephony operators will use until after the World Radiocommunication Conference ends in June. Anatel President Renato Guerreiro made the announcement in April just...
Although GSM technology has scant market share in Latin America, the 2000 GSM Association Plenary in Santiago, Chile, in late April was the stage for several Latin American GSM announcements. Juan Carlos Jil, chairman of GSM Association South America, said Nuevatel PCS in Bolivia,...
SINGAPORE-Falling margins, cheaper alternatives and technological obsolescence have combined to deal a major blow to Singapore's four paging operators.From an all-time high of 1.36 million subscribers in June 1998-representing a penetration of more than 40 percent, the world's highest-the paging market in the small...
WASHINGTON-A divided federal appeals court in Atlanta ruled wireless carriers and Internet firms do not have the same right as other telecom service providers to access utility poles on a nondiscriminatory basis-an unexpected decision that could hurt mobile-phone antenna siting and the rollout of...
SEATTLE-U S West Inc. customers now have wireless access to the company's Internet e-mail and personal information management services due to a joint effort with VirtualTek Corp., a developer of Web-based and wireless collaboration software.The service uses U S West's MyDesk and Wireless BrowserNow,...
DENVER-U S West Inc. reported first-quarter financial results ending March 31 that showed its wireless services added almost 135,000 new subscribers during the quarter and an average revenue per user of $54.The company's total operating revenue was up almost 10 percent compared with the...
