Pumpkin power dawns for African mobile phone networks
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – Palm and pumpkin seed oil could soon be generating electricity to help power mobile phone networks across Africa under a plan to replace fossil fuels with sustainable biofuels made from crops grown by local farmers.
Swedish telecoms networks group Ericsson and South African cellphone operator MTN said on Wednesday they want to start replacing diesel with biofuels in electricity generating stations powering mobile phone base stations in rural Africa.
Supported by the GSM Association’s development fund, they will start with a project in Nigeria to use biofuels for power generators supplying mobile base stations located beyond the reach of the electricity grid.
“We’re planning to replicate this in Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya. India and Bangladesh have also expressed interest,” said Ben Soppitt, program manager emerging markets at the GSM Association (GSMA).
Starting in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, fuel will be processed from palm, groundnut, pumpkin seeds and jatropha.
The crops to generate the biofuel will be cultivated close to the base stations, helping local farmers, cutting dependency on fossil fuels and reducing fuel transportation needs. The cost of fuel, including security to protect transport and storage, can be 80 percent of the cost of a rural phone network.
MTN operates in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East and had 31 million subscribers, while Ericsson is the world’s biggest mobile phone networks company with around 30 percent market share.
AFRICA TAKES THE LEAD
“The early adoption of biofuel-powered mobile networks would place Africa at the forefront of a new wave of innovation,” said Karel Pienaar, chief technology officer at MTN.
Soppitt said the mobile industry could be the world’s first to put alternative energy at the core of its operations.
“Ericsson has been working on this for a while, and with their significant market share the entire market will move with them,” he said.
Rural areas in emerging economies where most new mobile phone subscribers come from are often not connected to the electricity grid, which means that the base stations to connect mobile phone users to the network are powered by generators.
In Nigeria, 75 percent of the country is not grid-connected.
Fuel consumption by these base stations can be significant. Ericsson estimates 25,000 liters of fuel are needed every year to power a base station. The same amount would power close to 20 cars, each driving 20,000 kilometers, for a year.
Worldwide, tens of thousands of new base stations are erected every year, most of them in rural areas as operators aim to expand the coverage of their networks. There are currently close to 2.5 billion mobile phone users on the planet.
The GSMA hopes that the introduction of biofuels will be significantly cheaper than using diesel, and hopes for total cost reductions of 30 percent or more.
“You need to achieve a 30 percent improvement to create sufficient momentum for change,” Soppitt said.
Ericsson estimates around 0.5 square kilometers of palm oil crops are needed to generate the fuel for 20 base stations, the equivalent of 83 football fields.
The crops will be processed into fuel at local facilities.
Ericsson will control farming methods, making sure crops are not genetically manipulated, are grown sustainably and do not require fresh clearing of land by cutting forests.
Solar and wind energy are also being investigated as alternative power sources for remote base stations.
Source- http://us.rd.yahoo.com
Nokia to launch phones across price segments in India
Manila, Oct 08: Undaunted by increasing competition, the world’s biggest mobile phone maker Nokia has identified India as a “very high growth” market and plans to launch phones across price segments to maintain market leadership.
“If we categorise the world into very high, medium and low growth countries, India would be in the very high growth group. The potential and the opportunities in the country are very high,” Nokia Asia-Pacific vice president (sales and market operations) Alex Lambeek said here.
The Finnish mobile giant started manufacturing phones in India early this year at its facility in Sriperumbudur near Chennai, where it is investing USD 150 million.
Lambeek said India was a large volume market in the Asia-Pacific region that is set to provide a large chunk of new buyers in the coming years.
“Between now and 2008, over half of new subscribers in the world would come from the Asia-Pacific region, driven largely by India, China, Bangladesh and Indonesia. So Asia-Pacific is critically important and India is a very large part of that,” he said.
Nokia, which commands a dominant share in the Indian mobile phone market, has of late faced competition from other players like Motorola, Sony Ericsson and Samsung who have been increasing sales, especially with the launch of sleek, trendy handsets.
Source- http://www.zeenews.com
Hungama Mobile ties up with UAE business enterprise Koohiji Group
South Asia’s premier mobile entertainment company Hungama Mobile and the Dubai-based diversified business enterprise Koohiji Group have formed a business alliance to provide Middle East and North African (MENA) wireless consumers access to a wide range of legitimate entertainment content. Users will be able to download the latest Bollywood songs from legitimate music and entertainment sources for personal use on their handsets.
As per the agreement, Hungama Mobile has appointed Digital City, a new strategic business unit established by the Koohiji Group, as their exclusive distributor for Bollywood and Indian digital entertainment content.
Describing the alliance as a significant step in the new media era, Mr. Saleem Mobhani, Chief Operating Officer of Hungama Mobile said, “The demand for Bollywood and related entertainment content has shot up dramatically over the last couple years, and Hungama Mobile being the world’s largest distributor of South Asian entertainment content, MENA consumers will have access to over all South Asian digital entertainment content, including content in 14 different languages”.
“We are continually working to forge strategic relationships with key digital entertainment players. We develop and deploy content across the spectrum of Music, Images, Video, Games and Applications for our current relationship with 52 Operators and Partners in over 20 countries such as North America, UK and Europe, South Africa, Australia, Germany, South East Asia etc. and Digital Entities such as iTunes, Napster, Yahoo and others to extend Hungama Mobile’s presence in new media entertainment globally.” said Ali Hussein, Head of Hungama Mobile for MENA.
Speaking on the occasion SS Rajkumar, vice chairman and CEO of the Koohiji said, “So far, users in the UAE and in the region have been deprived of choices, up-to-date and easy access to Indian entertainment content for their mobile devices. As exclusive content distributors for Hungama Mobile, Digital City will bridge that gap and serve as a one stop shop for all content resellers and mobile operators offering digital mobile entertainment across the UAE and MENA region”.
For Hungama Mobile, the tie up with Koohiji Group is yet another milestone following the recent tie up with the Apple Inc-promoted iTunes, where the music of the Shah Rukh Khan-starrer Don was made available worldwide on the iTunes Music Store. The tie up further establishes Hungama Mobile’s growing bandwidth in helping the Indian entertainment industry reach out to the global audience.
About UAE and the Indian Entertainment Industry
Indian entertainment industry, particularly Indian films have always had unprecedented success in the Middle East, especially the UAE. While the economic boom in the region has been primarily led by growing oil exports, countries across the Gulf have, over the years, increased focus on industrial diversification. In UAE, of the 26 percent GDP growth last year, more than 60 percent was non-oil based, and 50 percent came from the service sector including media and entertainment services. The growing interest in Indian entertainment industry also drove the UAE government to host the IIFA Awards in Dubai earlier this year. The annual Dubai International Film Festival which began in 2004 also provides a strong platform to the Indian Entertainment Industry to showcase its boundless talents and expertise in the field of film making.
About Koohiji Group
The Dubai based Koohiji Group began operations in 1985 by as a trading house dealing in consumer electronics and communication products. Over time, Koohiji Group has emerged as an efficient marketing operation with a diverse portfolio of products including telecommunication & office automation products, wireless communication products HVACR equipment and auto spare parts. At present, the Koohiji Group runs its operations under four strategic business units – Komtell LLC (Telecommunication), Globalnet LLC (Wireless Communication Products), Technocare LLC (Customer Care), and Royal Gulf LLC (Air-conditioning). Digital City, the exclusive content distributors for Hungama Mobile is the fifth strategic business unit of the rapidly expanding group.
About Hungama Mobile
Hungama Mobile, the largest aggregator, publisher and developers of Indian Entertainment Content globally, deals directly with various movie production houses and music labels for digital promotions of their content. The company has an exclusive agreement with Super Cassettes Industries Ltd, Sony Pictures Television International and other production houses that form an integral part of the content catalogue which currently have over 100,000 songs, 25,000 Images and 15,000 Video titles. Hungama Mobile delivers innovative content such as Meet and Greet with Celebrities, movie merchandise, and movie tickets to drive content consumption for their partners. Hungama Mobile is the first ever organization to offer a movie zone on a Mobile handset. They are also the first to stream an entire movie on a wireless network and are the only Indian company to deals directly with Apple I-tunes. Key achievements include being the only Indian company to be nominated for three International awards in the ‘Best Music’, ‘Best Mobile Entertainment Marketing’ and ‘Best Mobile Marketing Service Provider’.
About Digital City
A part of the Dubai based Koohiji Group; Digital City will address the growing demand for digital entertainment content and serve as a one stop shop which meets the needs of all mobile operators and content re-sellers across the MENA region. Digital City will offer a diverse range of digital entertainment content including Arabic, Hollywood, Bollywood, Indian, Pakistani, Philippines, Persian, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan and African content to suit the preferences of all users across the MENA region.
Source- http://www.agencyfaqs.com
Technorati : Hungama Mobile, Mobile, South Asia
Ice Rocket : Hungama Mobile, Mobile, South Asia
Ericsson to expand TMIB’s network in Bangladesh
TM International Bangladesh (TMIB), a telecommunications service provider in Bangladesh, has selected Ericsson to expand its GSM/GPRS network in the Dhaka and Chittagong areas.Under the agreement, Ericsson will provide core and radio networks, and a range of telecommunication services, including installation, commissioning, optimisation and tuning. The deployment has started and is expected to be completed by the end of the year.Apart from being able to accommodate new subscriber growth on its network, the expansion is expected to provide TMIB’s subscribers better end-user experience in terms of network quality and performance.
TMIB operates in Bangladesh under the brand Aktel, which is a joint venture between Malaysia’s Telecom Malaysia International and the local AK Khan Group.
Source-http://www.digitalmediaasia.com
TM associate awards Ericsson Bangladeshi contract
Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) associate company TM International Bangladesh Ltd (TMIB) has awarded Ericsson a contract to expand its GSM/GPRS network in the Dhaka and Chittagong areas of Bangladesh, which would involve the deployment of new sites and allow TMIB to expand its network coverage and capacity.
TM holds a 49% stake in TMIB, which is a JV between the telecommunication company and AK Khan & Co Ltd and operates under the Aktel brand name.
Under the terms of the agreement, Ericsson would provide TIMB with core and radio network equipment with enhanced software features and the provision of a comprehensive range of telecommunication services, which includes installation, commissioning and optimisation.
In a statement yesterday, Ericsson said the deployment of the project has already begun and was expected to be completed by year-end. It said the exercise would provide TMIB greater coverage and increase its network capacity significantly.
It said the increased capacity would enable TMIB to accommodate new subscriber growth on its network while ensuring high level of network performance.
With over 14 million people, the two cities have the highest percentage of mobile users in the country. The two cities also account for more than half of Bangladesh’s population and were considered prime drivers of mobile usage growth.
Ericsson Southeast Asia president and Malaysia country manager Jan Signell said: “Ericsson is proud to play yet another key role in taking TMIB’s network to reach more Bangladeshi’s and we are fully committed towards supporting TMIB in strengthening its leadership in Bangladesh, as well as retaining its competitiveness in the future.”
“We are confident that with our strong local presence and in-country technical and rollout expertise, we will be able to meet TMIB’s aggressive timelines as well as making sure that this project exceeds TMIB’s high expectations,” he added.
Source- http://www.theedgedaily.com
Technorati : Bangladesh, Ericsson, Mobile, Telecom Malaysia
Ice Rocket : Bangladesh, Ericsson, Mobile, Telecom Malaysia
Ringtone reality check: India cellphone story long way to go
NEW DELHI, SEPTEMBER 18: India hopes to be a telecom major by 2020 but trends indicate it is still on the dark side of the wireless divide: rural teledensity is still at 2 per cent, roughly where it was at the time of Independence, as against 40 per cent teledensity in the urban areas.
Fresh data for 2005-06 filed by telecom regulators the world over shows that mobile phones are a much bigger story elsewhere in the world, even in the neighbourhood.
Mobile phones have now reached 8 per cent of India’s 1 billion-strong population but in March 2006 Pakistan achieved a mobile teledensity of 14 per cent, clocking an impressive 170 per cent growth rate the previous year. India’s mobile teledensity is growing at 60-65 per cent a year.
Strife-torn Sri Lanka has al so done well: it crossed the 17 per cent mobile teledensity mark in early 2006 and its mobile phones are growing at 50 per cent every year. Bangladesh too has gone places: It registered a 138 per cent mobile phone growth rate in 2005 which no one expects to falter.
Nripendra Mishra, chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, says “I think changes in rural India’s teledensity will show up in the next six or eight months – the moment we announce that the Universal Service Obligation (USO) fund will be given out for cellular telephony. In addition, new technologies like WiFi and WiMax will go into rural areas sooner than the land lines or mobile phone networks, and will make a serious impact for the better.”
India’s neighbours, including or excluding China, are not just distributing phones faster. They are also competing harder for investments that global telecom firms are now ready to make. In addition, mobile teledensity improves GDP, which could make India’s telecom rivals far more successful in other ways too. Analysts are beginning to caution that the only reason why India’s teledensity looks so good is because of its sheer size.
“We are not doing as well as our neighbours in expanding connectivity, be it Bangladesh, Sri Lanka or Pakistan. Though we are adding many phones in urban areas, rural teledensity is still at 2 per cent, roughly where it was when we became independent. We just keep on giving new mobile phones to those in big cities who already have land lines,” says telecom analyst Mahesh Uppal. Despite the wide contrasts in per capita income and GDP, sometimes its hard to tell who’s catching up on whom between India and its neighbours.
Even Afghanistan, where the mobile networks were built afresh in 2002 after years of wars, mobile teledensity has touched 4 per cent. This is just below the global low-income average, but Afghanistan is starting from a near-zero mobility base.
India may be a minnow before telecom heavyweights China, Taiwan, US but some of its biggest rivals are right next door. India and other Asian countries like Mongolia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand launched their mobile networks in roughly the same decades but India lags behind the rest. Mongolia achieved 20 per cent mobile teledensity in 2006, though it started in 2000 with only two per cent – that’s a 100 per cent growth rate. Malaysia had 80 per cent mobile penetration in early 2006 and its people sent nine million SMS’ in 2005 which makes them the second best performers on this front, only after Singapore.
There is a reason why India has become a big telecom success story but not the biggest. For one, the rural teledensity target in India has been pending since 1995 (at 10 per cent) although urban mobile teledensity has skyrocketed to 40 per cent. Besides, Indian companies are waiting in the wings for their big chance: A government subsidy for going rural.
Changes in rural India’s teledensity is key because as we speak, Hong Kong is achieving 125 per cent mobile teledensity, South Korea 90 per cent, Australia 95 per cent and Japan 76 per cent. Weren’t these countries our real competition when we started out in 1991, not Bhutan or Nepal (both with 2 per cent)?
Source- http://www.indianexpress.com
Bangladesh among Asia’s top 10 mobile markets
has emerged as one of
‘s top 10 mobile phone markets in terms of adding net subscribers, according to the chairman of GSM Asia Pacific, a regional forum of the Generalised System of Multiple Access (GSMA) mobile operators, reports BDNEWS.
GSM Asia Pacific Chairman Mehboob Chowdhury warned that though Bangladesh the 8th top mobile market in Asia, ahead of Thailand and Philippines, it would be impossible to retain that position unless the government immediately purged the industry of the ‘counterproductive’ policies and shook up the telecom regulators.
Besides, the country has added 8.945 million GSMA mobile users in a single year — from July 2005 to June 2006, according to the latest figure of GSMA association.
In an exclusive interview with the news agency, Chowdhury disclosed thatnow ranked eighth among the top 10 Asian mobile markets in terms of adding net subscribers during January to March, 2006.
Citing the data of Informal Telecoms and Media, a London-based research firm, he saidhas had 1.265 million new users during the first quarter of 2006. The figure is slightly lower than the net addition ofandcombined, and marginally lower than seventh-ranked’s first quarter intake.
, fifth on the list, has added more than two million mobile subscribers during this period, but its total clientele was smaller than whathad in the first quarter of 2006.
GSM Asia Pacific chairman credited the cellular mobile operators with this achievement while being critical of the government’s ‘pounding the industry with disruptive policies’.
“When the operators made new connections affordable and started slashing the call charges; the government came up with this disastrous tax last year. It was a bolt from the blue (for the operators) that slowed down the market for a while.”
The new 8.945 million GSMA mobile users that have putin the global map is the result of the operators’ continuous effort, Chowdhury pointed out.
The new customers belong to the middle-to-lower income bracket that have been perennially ‘harassed’ by the state-run Bangladesh Telegraph and Telephone Board (BTTB) in trying to get regular phone connections.
“The private sector has salvaged them and that’s why the subscribers identity module (SIM) tax is grossly an anti-people move, which the government should scrap ahead of the election.”
“The market could have added at least four million more customers, there could have been an euphoric outbreak of tariff war and the government could have earned more revenue from the boom (if the tax were not there)”, Chowdhury continued.
Liking the slapping of SIM tax to killing the golden goose, he said this testifies to ‘the government’s inability’ to understand the fundamentals of this business.
He refused to give the government much credit for slashing the tax from mobile phone handsets.
“The amount of tax the government has withdrawn from handset is the exact amount it has simultaneously imposed as SIM tax and the burden remains unchanged for new customers”, pointed out Chowdhury, who was GrameenPhone’s marketing director for five years and Banglalink’s Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) for nearly a year until resigning recently .
He said more than two billion people use GSM mobile phones worldwide, accounting for an 82.4 per cent penetration. Asia Pacific region alone boasts 757.13 million GSMA mobile users and the figure is fast growing.
“Every second 18 new GSM users are being added worldwide, which means more than 1,000 customers in every minute and over 1.5 million new GSMA mobile users per day.”
Chowdhury said the next billion GSMA customers are mostly coming from,,,,,,and other similar economies.
He recognised continuous investment as the key component for sustainable mobile phone market growth in.
Effective telecommunications regulatory regime is, however, the precondition to wooing new investments and boosting competition.
“The Bangladesh Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (BTRC) has become merely an extension of the taxation department and that is certainly not the case with,or”, he said.
“[And] That’s why the telecom markets of these South Asian countries have been consistently thriving.”
More than 85 per cent of the mobile phone users have no access to the largest fixed telephone operator BTTB, the state-owned monopoly that has little relevance in today’s mobile market, Chowdhury regretted.
“The mobile operators will not even bother to talk to the BTTB the moment the government ends its monopoly on the international voice gateway”, he predicted.
The BTTB’s denial to provide interconnection is a clear breach of the telecoms law and resents the regulator’s ‘unfair concession’ for BTTB on this issue, the former Banglalink CCO said.
The government is ‘draining’ public funds on ‘impractical projects’ like VoIP platforms, he complained.
“Besides, ignoring the country’s fundamental telecommunication needs, the government is going to waste hundreds of millions of dollars in highly debatable and grossly unproductive supplier’s credit telecoms schemes”, he added.
The government has to deploy reliable nationwide telecoms infrastructure and then ensure the private sector’s equitable access to that resource, Chowdhury suggested.
“This is what Pakistan, India and many other fast developing countries are doing and Bangladesh should waste no time to reinvent the wheel”, he remarked.
Source- http://www.financialexpress-bd.com
Technorati : BTRC, Bangladesh, GSM, Mobile
Ice Rocket : BTRC, Bangladesh, GSM, Mobile
Motorola’s Zander Banks on Even Thinner Phones to Gain on Nokia
Aug. 22 (Bloomberg) — Motorola Inc. Chief Executive Officer Ed Zander is betting a new generation of super-thin, low-cost phones will help him boost profitability and break the dominance of industry leader Nokia Oyj in China and India.
“This is our chance to go after them,” Zander said in an interview this month in Schaumburg, Illinois, where Motorola is based. “We know where the No. 1 gets its numbers. It’s these emerging markets, and we have to go in there and go meet them.”
Motorola, the world’s second-largest maker of mobile phones, will start shipping the 1/3-inch-thick Motofone, its thinnest product yet, next month as it seeks to build on the success of the half-inch Razr. The first of the Scpl (pronounced “scalpel”) line, Motofone uses fewer parts, multiple-function chips and more efficient software to cut manufacturing costs.
The Motofone design means as many as 15 phones roll off the production line every second, up from five a second for the Razr. Zander needs that increase in productivity to reach an operating margin of 13 percent to 15 percent, a goal he has failed to meet since taking over in 2004. He declined to say when he might hit his target.
Even after selling more than 50 million phones in the Razr line, Motorola’s 11.2 percent operating margin — or percentage of net sales left after subtracting the costs to make and sell products — lags behind Nokia’s 16.7 percent.
Toward 15 Percent
“The Scpl Motofone will be the quickest-to-manufacture product in the world,” Ron Garriques, president of Motorola’s mobile unit, said in an interview. “This platform will bring us toward that 15 percent profit number.”
Boosting profit margins and the company’s share of emerging- market business at the same time may be tough, said Inder Singh, an analyst at Prudential Equity Group Inc. who rates Motorola shares “neutral” and doesn’t own them.
“Entering emerging markets and looking for margin expansion is somewhat challenging,” said New York-based Singh. “Most new entries to emerging markets are tagged with higher initial costs, and Nokia being an entrenched competitor in many of those markets makes it harder.”
Shares of Motorola, up 4.6 percent this year, declined 17 cents to $23.63 yesterday in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. Shares of Espoo, Finland-based Nokia, up 7 percent this year, slipped 2 cents to 16.53 euros in Helsinki.
While the Scpl line will have some high-priced models, it will start with an inexpensive phone to capture market share in faster-growing regions. The introduction strategy contrasts with the first Razr phones, which targeted customers willing to spend more for a camera and other features.
Working Up
“We launched the Razr platform at the $800 price point and worked our way down,” Garriques said. “With the Scpl we’re using it to work up. We’ll have more scale faster than we had on the Razr platform.” Motorola already has orders for 2 million Motofones in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, he said.
Zander said he expects to sell phones as cheap as $35 in emerging markets. Total handset sales in the Asia Pacific region gained 52 percent in the second quarter, compared with just 9.5 percent in North America, according to research firm Strategy Analytics in Milton Keynes, England. Motorola hasn’t yet priced the Motofone.
“The opportunity in this market is the unconnected,” said Zander, 59. “It’s giving billions of people the capability to make a phone call, and you eventually get to sell all this other cool stuff.”
Motorola had a 16 percent share of the Asia Pacific market in the second quarter, trailing Nokia’s 35 percent. Motorola has a 22 percent share of the global market, compared with 33 percent for Nokia, Strategy Analytics said in an Aug. 15 report.
Trimmed Costs
In the same quarter, Motorola’s profit from continuing operations rose 47 percent to $1.35 billion, and Nokia’s net income jumped 43 percent to 1.14 billion euros ($1.5 billion). Both companies were helped by demand for phones in India and China, as well as pricier models.
Garriques, 42, trimmed costs and production time for the Motofone by integrating multiple functions into each electronic component to cut the number of parts. He also increased the number of parts used across the Scpl range, allowing Motorola to command lower prices from suppliers.
The company designed new software that requires less memory, new battery technology and a one-piece casing design to keep costs down. The phones have features tailored to emerging markets including displays for bright environments and longer battery life.
Razr sales will exceed the Scpl through 2008 as Motorola develops clamshell and keyboard Scpl models and introduces new Razrs with the goal of selling 300 million to 500 million of the current generation before the end of the line, Zander said.
He said teams are already working on the successor to the Scpl, which may arrive as soon as 2010. Motorola must keep introducing products to remain ahead of competitors in the same markets who copy elements of Motorola’s most popular designs, said Prudential’s Singh.
“In a world in which it’s easy to become the victim of copycats you have to run faster than the competition,” Singh said. “It’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon.”
Source- http://www.bloomberg.com
Technorati : Mobile, Motorola, Nokia
Ice Rocket : Mobile, Motorola, Nokia
After China, Ericsson Moves Into Indonesia and Bangladesh
An Ericsson statement said the company has signed a deal with
Indonesia’s largest cellular phone operator Telkomsel to provide a 3G/WCDMA network. Another statement said it has been given a managed services contract by Warid Telecom for a GSM/GPRS network in
Bangladesh. Under a three-year agreement signed with Telkomsel, Ericsson will deliver a 3G/WCDMA radio and core network, including HSPA, with deployment beginning immediately. The contract also includes three years of managed services, with Ericsson providing a comprehensive services offering including establishing, operating and managing the operations of Telkomsel’s 3G network. Bengt Thornberg, Country Manager of Ericsson
Indonesia, said: “We have had a longstanding cooperation with Telkomsel for more than 10 years and we are honored to be selected to deliver its 3G network in
Indonesia. Our solutions will allow Telkomsel to introduce new and advanced services in the country.”
Telkomsel is 65 percent owned by PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia Tbk and 35 percent by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd.
The
Bangladesh contract covers the operation, management and maintenance of Warid Telecom’s core GSM/network, backbone transmission and real-time charging/Value Added Services (VAS). This agreement is an extension to the contract signed earlier this year where Ericsson was chosen by Warid Telecom to supply and implement the complete core and backbone transmission equipment for its nationwide GSM/GPRS network. Ericsson will now also manage Warid Telecom’s radio network in the western part of the country, covering the areas of Rajshahi,
Khulna, and
Barisal.
Muneer Farooqui, Warid Telecom CEO said: “By having Ericsson to manage and operate our network, we are able to focus our resources on building our branding, sales and marketing activities, strengthening our customer services and developing more services that meet our subscribers’ needs and expectations.”
Jan Signell, President, Ericsson South East Asia, added: “We are proud of being selected by Warid Telecom in this contract. We have enjoyed a fruitful managed services partnership with them in
Pakistan, where Warid has exceeded its own expectation. We are committed to ensure that Warid Telecom repeats similar success in
Bangladesh.” The GSM expansion contracts with China Mobile together worth $550 million were signed during the first half of 2006. They include projects in 17 regions of
China. Ericsson has already started deliveries of network equipment which it claims will be able to support nearly 200 million subscribers across the 17 regions. Under the contracts, Ericsson will provide China Mobile with core and radio networks, together with related technical support and services. It will also deploy its Mobile Softswitch Solution in the contracted regions.
Source- http://news.tmcnet.com
Technorati : Bangladesh, Ericsson, Indonesia, Mobile
Ice Rocket : Bangladesh, Ericsson, Indonesia, Mobile
