Zain’s legal dispute with Nigerian assets might delay Bharti deal

On 03.06.10, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The pending legal dispute over the ownership of Zain on its Nigerian assets might lead to the delay in the selling of the African assets by the company to Indian telco, Bharti Airtel. Econet Wireless Holdings and Zain have been undergoing a long dispute and the former has claimed a right of first refusal when a collection of shareholders sold their stakes to Zain in 2006.

5% of Vee Mobile which trades as Zain Nigeria is still owned by Econet and since the sale of the network first suggested back in 2003, it has been fighting attempts to bypass its claimed rights to buy out shareholders. In 2003 itself, due to Econet’s pressure, South Africa’s Vodacom retreat its decision to buy a controlling stake in the company.

After that, Delta State and First Bank along with various shareholders sold their stakes to Celtel Wireless which is now a Zain subsidiary, in September 2005 and since then the sale has been in dispute ever.

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Zain Nigeria dispute to affect Bharti buy out

On 02.23.10, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Minority shareholder Broad Communications Ltd, which owns 14% share in Zain Nigeria, will seek to enforce its rights in any potential transfer of ownership in the company. The announcement came after Bharti Airtel entered into exclusive talks with Zain until March 25 to buy most of Kuwait-based Mobile Telecommunications Co. or Zain’s assets in Africa in a deal that could be worth up to $10.7 billion.

According to the largest minority shareholder in Zain Nigeria, Broad, the company has not been formally informed by the Zain Group of its intention to sell its 65% shareholding in the Nigerian entity and the company intend to fully exercise its pre-emption rights as directed by the courts and as guided by the company’s shareholders’ agreements entered into between the company’s shareholders.

The dispute over ownership of the largest unit in Nigeria might disrupt Bharti’s third attempt to enter the African market. Econent Wireless Holdings Ltd., a South African telecommunications company is attempting to overturn a 2006 deal in which Celtel, now known as Zain, bought a controlling 65% of the business that had been founded at the beginning of that decade by a group of government, institutional and private investors.

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Zain receives offer to sell African networks

On 02.15.10, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: An unnamed group has offered K¬uwait based Zain to acquire its operations in Africa excluding Morocco and Sudan. Though the name has not been divulged by the company, the local media group suggests that the company might be India’s Bharti Airtel.

It has been reported that Bharti Airtel has offered around US$10.7 billion for the former Celtel networks while Zain acquired the pan-Africa Celtel for $3.4 billion in 2005.

Over a year, Zain has been seeking to either sell the African networks or take an outside investor into the whole company.

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Zain denies the sale of its African assets

On 02.09.10, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Reports that Kuwait operator Zain was in talks with Vivendi, France Telecom and Vodafone to offer a possible sale of the former Celtel networks has been denied by the telco. It was reported by a newspaper that Zain had been in talks with the other operators for the past couple of months and is seeking US$11-US$12 billion for its African assets.

Last year, Vivendi’s plan to buy the African networks, for a reported US$12 billion was said to be an all-share based transaction, with Zain taking 20 percent of Vivendi, in exchange for 10 percent of Zain Africa.

However, Vodafone recently increased its holdings in South Africa based Vodacom to 65%,

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Nextel receives nationwide licence (Peru)

On 08.12.09, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Peru’s Ministry of Transport and Communications (MTC) has reportedly extended Nextel Peru’s concession to allow the iDEN network operator to operate nationally. The nationwide concession is believed to be valid for 20 years, media reports. The MTC resolution stipulates that Nextel must sign the concession within 60 days of the publication of the resolution, or forfeit the licence.

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NCC slashes mobile interconnection fees by 43% (Namibia)

On 07.11.09, In Mobile, By Editor

www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Namibian Communication Commission has passed a resolution under which the mobile-to-mobile network interconnection fees has been slashed by 43% to NAD0.60 with effect from 1 July, beginning of a four-phase plan ending January 2011, when a single charge of NAD0.30 per minute will apply, 72% less than the existing rate of NAD1.06. Accordng to a media report, the interconnection fees for mobile-to-fixed line, fixed-to-mobile and international-to-mobile through the network of incumbent fixed line operator Telecom Namibia have also been standardised to NAD0.60.
NCC decision was driven bt complaints from Cell One and Telecom Namibia, who accused MTC, the market leader of charging high interconnection fees. charges. The regulator’s statement says that ‘asymmetric termination rates are not the best tools to facilitate market entry,’ adding that ‘the prescribed ceiling for January 2011 for termination rates includes a 25% mark-up over the estimated cost of termination.’

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New telcos propose low termination fee (India)

On 03.05.09, In Mobile, By Editor

Swan, Unitech, Datacom, Loop and Reliance Communications have proposed TRAI to slash the termination charges, while existing GSM players, led by Bharti, want the 30 paise per minute charge to continue. The lower termination fee in the overall review of interconnection charge will affect the retail tariff.

“The termination charge for new entrants is a cost and not revenue. The charge has a direct bearing on retail tariffs. Higher the termination charge, higher will be the retail tariffs and therefore it is anti-consumer, besides reducing the margins and competitive ability of new entrants to match the tariffs of the established and large operators. The termination charge is around 30-50% of the total retail tariff. The new entrants will have to match or provide lower tariffs than incumbent operators charge”, said the new operator.

The reduction in mobile termination charge (MTC) would lead to substantial drop in retail tariff, according to RCom.

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Orascom’s Telecel acquires Namibia’s Cell One

On 01.15.09, In Mobile, By Editor

A subsidiary of Egypt’s Orascom Telecom, Telecel Globe has acquired Namibian 2G/3G cellco Powercom (trading as Cell One) for around US$59 million. According to a recent data, Cell One launched a GSM-900/1800 network in March 2007 before expanding coverage to all 13 regions of the country, and it switched on a W-CDMA-based 3G network in June 2008, with coverage limited to parts of the capital, Windhoek. The company, which competes with larger rival MTC, was formerly owned by Telecom Management Partner Holdings (itself owned by Norway’s Telenor, 39%), NamPower (37%), Zeven Investment Corporation (formerly Namibia Mineworkers’ Investment Holdings, 12%), domestic finance house Old Mutual (10%) and Powercom Educational Development Trust (2%).

Telecel Globe’s CEO Kai Uebach said that ‘Cell One is well positioned in the Namibian market to become the key provider of competitive mobile voice and data services. Telecel Globe expects the investment in Cell One to have a positive effect on the brand, the customers and Namibia as a whole. This investment will further strengthen the traditionally good relationship and mutual trust between Namibia and Egypt. This acquisition will further enable Cell One to grow its customer base and deliver both essential services and groundbreaking communication solutions for the Namibian market.’ Presently, Cell One has a subscriber base of 198,000.

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Peru’s subscribers to enjoy NP free of charge

On 11.28.08, In Mobile, By Editor

Mobile subscribers of Peru will enjoy number portability free of charge, said Deputy Communications Minister, Gonzalo Ruiz. The government will try to guarantee an easy process for users willing to port their mobile numbers, he added.
In January 2009, Number Portability (NP) is scheduled for implementation in Peru and telecoms regulator Osiptel has recently published the regulations for number portability implementation.
The transport and communications ministry (MTC) has given consent over the use of the All Call Query (ACQ) methodology for NP in Peru. A central database will be created of ported numbers which operators will consult for every call to find out which network a dialled number belongs to.
The telecoms operator will invest approximately US$22million to implement Number Portability.

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