France Telecom & Divona win Tunisia licence

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: France Telecom and Tunisian partner Divona have got a licence for mobile and fixed-line phone services in the north African country with a winning bid of 257 million dinars ($189.7 million). “This was an excellent offer given the current crisis,” Tunisian Communication Minister Haj Klai, reportedly said.

He said France Telecom and Divona planned to invest 1 billion dinars to roll out their network in the country of 10.5 million and would create 1,000 to 2,000 direct jobs. The licence will entail the installation of network infrastructure and the provision of second- and third-generation mobile services. The France Telecom consortium beat a competing bid from Turkish mobile phone company Turkcell.

“The consortium will begin its services on Jan. 1, 2010,” Klai said.