Bharti Infratel files legal case against STel (India)
Bharti Infratel has sued telecom operator STel for not paying outstanding rent on 1,200 tenancies it had leased from the company, according to a report by ET. As per the report, Bharti Infratel filed a suit in the Delhi High Court early this month saying STel used its towers for providing mobile services to its subscribers over the last two years, without disclosing the amount.
The report reveals that STel said that deliberations were on between the companies, in an attempt to settle the dispute. Previously, Reliance Infratel, had also taken STel to the telecom tribunal seeking recovery of dues from the operator for the infrastructure it had taken on lease in 2009.
STel held 2G mobile permits in Bihar, Orissa, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Assam and the northeastern region; and 3G spectrum in Bihar, Orissa and Himachal Pradesh.
SC directs TDSAT to decide Idea’s plea on 3G allocation (India)
The Supreme Court has asked the telecom tribunal TDSAT to decide the plea of Aditya Birla group firm Idea Cellular against DoT to issue it 3G spectrum in Punjab where the allocation has been pending because of Idea’s merger with Spice Telecom.
A bench comprising Justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly asked the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal to take a decision on the plea of Idea.
As per the bench, it is related with 3G spectrum allocation and it should be dealt with separately.
The TDSAT had stopped hearing after the Attorney General had mentioned before the Tribunal that the Supreme Court had restrained all courts from passing any order on allocation of spectrum.
Following that, Idea had approached the Supreme Court seeking its clarification on the issue.
Reliance Communications to repay short term loans (India)
Reliance Communications Limited has drawn down first tranche of US$ 665 million from China Development Bank underwritten facility of US$ 1.93 Billion.
The facility includes US$1.33 billion for refinancing 3G spectrum fee payment and US$600 million for equipment imports from Chinese Vendors.
The drawn down amount will be utilized to refinance company’s short term rupee borrowings resulting in substantial savings in its interest cost apart from extending its debt maturity profile.
The loan facility is fully underwritten by CDB and is being funded by a syndicate of Chinese Banks and Financial Institutions including CDB. This is the first and largest ever syndicated loan for refinancing spectrum fees by any telecom company.
Mobile operators in Thailand forge ahead despite 3G setback
A new research report has revealed that despite the delayed auctioning of 3G spectrum in Thailand, mobile operators are moving forward with their 3G plans as data services continue to be the main driver of growth.
According to sources, operators have moved forward with 3G implementation in two ways: 1) receiving approval to upgrade networks to HSPA, and 2) signing MVNO agreements with TOT. These solutions would serve as stopgap measures before the 3G auction, which could happen by early 2012.
TOT is currently the only 2.1GHz 3G operator, serving the greater Bangkok region. TOT plans to invest $648 million in HSPA to cover 50 percent of the population by mid-2011, giving TOT a head start over the competition. Data services have been the main driver of growth in the mobile market this year, which is why operators are eager to forge ahead with 3G before the auction.
According to the report, smartphone sales grew strongly at 18% from 2008 to 2010, and are expected to grow at an even higher 30% CAGR from 2010 to 2015. Along with this growth, usage of data applications like email, video, and Internet browsing will grow, as well. Data cards will exhibit the highest growth at a 63% CAGR, as 3G networks, which currently are only operated by TOT and only cover the Bangkok area, are extended to cover 50% of the population by June 2011.
For buying 3G equipment Vodafone will invest 500 million dollars
Marten Peters, the chief executive officer of Vodafone Essar stated that the company for procuring electronic equipment for its third generation service will spend in the tune of four hundred to five hundred million dollars before the launch of the same in the first quarter of 2011.
The company will arrange for the funds by taking bank loans and offering some new shares to its existing shareholders.
Vodafone Essar the third biggest telecom provider of the nation in terms of subscription had spent in the tune of eleven thousand six hundred and eighteen crores of rupees for acquiring the 3G spectrum in the month of May. Mr. Peters added that the company paid that massive amount as there was an artificial dearth of bandwidth.
Vodafone will launch its services, dividing them into phases. The 3G services will first start from metro cities like Mumbai and Delhi and gradually it will spread over all circles of Maharashtra, Kolkata, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and West Bengal. These facts were given by Mr. Sanjoy Mukherjee the director of business operation of Vodafone Essar.
Marten Peters added saying that Vodafone is negotiating with other top quality and long term operators like the Idea Cellular and Bharti Airtel to distribute 3G services where Vodafone does not have 3G airwaves.
The whole idea of taking this move is to provide the customers the experience of 3G services all across the country regardless of the circle owned by Vodafone or any other operator as stated by the Vodafone director of business operations, Mr. Sunil Sood.
Sanjoy Mukherjee further stated that the 3G service will have reasonable pricing and will vary from location to location and on its usage. He cited example stating in cities video calls will be less expensive from the video call s of a remote village.
Mock auctions for 3G spectrum conducted by DoT (India)
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A mock auction of 3G spectrum was held by the Indian government. A meeting has also been convened by the government where it will brief the bidders about the aspects of the real auction on Friday.
The aim of the mock auction was to familiarize the nine 3G and 11 broadband wireless access (BWA) bidders with the system and clarify their technical queries about the auction.
The meeting will be attended by Department of Telecom official NM Rothschild, Finance Secretary Ashok Chawla, Home Secretary G K Pillai, Trai Chairman J S Sarma, HDFC Chairman Deepak Parekh, Pratyush Sinha, CVC, and Sam Pitroda, Advisor, infrastructure to the Prime Minister, Telecom Secretary P J Thomas and a host of officials from the department.
Vijaylaxmi Gupta, DoT Member (finance) will chair the meeting. Nine companies have been shortlisted to bid for three-four slots of 5MHz of 3G spectrums while 11 bidders will bid two slots of BWA. Government hopes to collect about Rs 30-Rs 35,000 from the auction of the radio waves. Rs 3500 crore has been fixed as reserve price for a pan-India 3G license and Rs 1,750 crore for BWA.
India’s 3 telecom biggies to join 3G race
India’s Telecoms majors including names like Bharti, Reliance and Vodafone have confirmed that they are all set to bid for 3G licenses.
According to the reports, Idea Cellular is also expected to submit its application for 3G spectrum very soon.
While Bharti and Reliance are seeking spectrum in each of India’s 22 telecom zones, Telenor-backed Uninor might also bid for 2100 MHz in the metro circles apart from other lucrative regions in the country.
Should India leapfrog to 4G?
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: While Indian private telecom operators are still waiting to get the license to provide 3G services, a question has creep into Indian telecom sector, should they leapfrog from the existing 2G network to fourth generation (4G) technology and give third generation (3G) a skip?
4G technologies has already been developed and adopted globally but Long-Term Evolution (LTE) is the most talked about topic as some operators in Europe and the US have already started commercial deployment on this platform.
India is already nine years behind other countries when it comes to introducing 3G technology add to the fact that Indian operators are still on plain old GSM network. Also the delay from the Indian government to hold an auction to provide 3G licenses has made the debate all the more intense since the government took four years to discuss and debate various aspects of auctioning 3G spectrum and still there is no finality.
