Egypt to sign 3rd mobile license contract with UAE company-led consortium

The Egyptian government is expected to officially sign on Aug. 21 the third mobile-network license contract with a consortium led by Etisalat, a UAE-based telecom company, the state-run daily Al-Gomhuria reported.

Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif will attend the signing ceremony, said the daily.

The new company led by Etisalat is set to begin providing mobile services by mid-February in 2007 in major Egyptian cities and resorts, such as Cairo, Alexandria, Hurghada and Sharm el- Sheikh, according to Egyptian Minister of Communications and Information Technology Tareq Kamel.

The Etisalat-led consortium has deposited the full amount of the license fees to an designated Egyptian bank account, said Amr Badawi, Chairman of the National Agency for Regulation of Telecommunications.

On July 4, Etisalat beat eight other bidders to win the third mobile phone network license, along with its three other Egyptian partners, namely, the Egypt Post, the National Bank of Egypt and the Commercial International Bank.

The consortium won the bid by offering a staggeringly high price at about 2.9 billion U.S. dollars.

The new service provider will use the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) system and the third-generation (3G) technology for its network.

The current Egyptian mobile service market is shared by Vodafone Egypt and Mobinil, a joint venture between Egypt’s Orascom Telecom Holding and France Telecom.

Vodafone Egypt and Mobinil had a combined subscribers of about 13 million at the end of 2005.

Source- http://english.people.com.cn

Technorati : 3G, Egypt, GSM, Mobinil, Orascom, Vodafone Egypt
Ice Rocket : 3G, Egypt, GSM, Mobinil, Orascom, Vodafone Egypt