T Mobile & Orange UK merger vital for competition: T Mobile
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The 50-50 joint venture, between Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile and France Telecom’s Orange in UK announced on September 8, 2009 is crucial for the two companies to be able to compete against bigger rivals.
The announcement was made by T-Mobile UK Managing Director Richard Moat. According to Moat, the margin pressures are altering the competitive landscape and altering the ability to fund the future.
The joint venture proposal is waiting for the nod from European Commission, which will investigate whether there will be any adverse effect on the market, has until Feb. 15 to rule on the joint venture.
UK’s largest mobile operator with a 37% market share will be created if the propsed venture is successful.
FNA receives six requests for spectrum auction in Germany
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Six requests have been received by Federal Network Agency (FNA) to take part in the country’s digital frequency auction scheduled for early in the second quarter of 2010. The applications will now be examined by FNA after which it will decide whether the companies are qualified to take part or not.
German telecoms giant Deutsche Telekom (DT), UK-based Vodafone, Spain’s Telefonica O2 Germany and E-Plus, the local unit of Netherlands-based group KPN, are all expected to be among those asking to be admitted as bidders.
It is one of the largest spectrum auctions in Germany since the allocation of UMTS concessions in 2000 and involves licenses for spectrum freed up in the switchover from analogue to digital television. The spectrum package includes 360MHz, 1.7GHz, 1.8GHz, 2GHz and 2.6GHz besides 60MHz in the digital dividend range of 800MHz.
Fibre infrastructure access fees proposed by Deutsche Telekom
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: German telecommunications regulator BNA has been approached by Deutsche Telekom to approve the charges for the use of three elements of its fibre-optic infrastructure. Access in multi-function cabinets for a monthly unit price has been offered by the operator. A corresponding portion of the unit price has been paid by other operators depending on how many slots they use.
A charge of EUR 173.32 per month has been proposed by DT for access in the multi-function cabinet having a maximum of four slots. EUR 0.43 per meter will be charged to have an access to DeTe’s cable channels for one quarter pipe per month and dark fibre use will be charged at EUR 353.96 per month offering flatrate for the use of two fibres for a single section from the main distribution frame.
Deutsche Telekom subsidiaries wanting to use the infrastructure will charge the fees.
Deutsche Telekom partnered municipalities to close digital divide
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: 720 partnership deals had been signed by German telecoms company Deutsche Telekom (DT) with municipalities across the country for expanding their broadband networks in 2009. Another 50 proposals are waiting for the municipal officials’ approval.
DT offers to cooperate with local communities whenever loss is incurred due to low potential customer bases and high broadband expansion costs. The remaining costs could be covered by the participation of the municipalities in the expansion through various ways like making available any existing cable ducts or conduits, or by taking on the necessary underground engineering measures.
Because of the partnership, 300,000 additional households can now enjoy high speed internet connections along with capacity upgrades and standard expansion. The company would rely heavily on a combination of technologies to enable more broadband connections in the future.
3,500 new hires in 2010 planned by Deutsche Telekom
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Hiring of 3,500 new people has been planned by Deutsche Telekom out of which roughly 1400 will be recent graduates and seasoned professionals. Young, talented employees with internal training including graduates from Deutsche Telekom’s cooperative study programs will be preferred for the remaining 2,100 jobs.
According to Thomas Sattelberger, Chief Human Resources Officer at Deutsche Telekom, dramatically widening skills gap and the demographic and technological shifts currently under way has made it imperative for the company to make new hiring.
Software developers, business administration graduates, product managers, business analysts and IT architects in particular will be sought on the external labor market.
One of the major reasons behind the hiring is to promote internal talent. 50 “high potentials” will also be recruited by the company for its newly developed young talent program (“Start up!”) who will complete their training by fulfilling a wide variety of functions across the company.
T-Mobile and Orange in U.K merger to be reviewed by European Commission
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A proposal has been filed by Deutsche Telekom AG and France Telecom to the European commission for a joint venture in the U.K. The step is taken four months after the announcement of the deal.
The deal for 50- 50 partnership between France Telecom’s Orange UK and Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile was announced on September 8. With 37% market share, the joint venture will create the U.K.’s largest mobile operator ahead of current leaders Telefonica SA’s O2 with its 27% share and Vodafone PLC’s 25%.
The European Commission has time until February 15 to complete the investigation of the adverse effect of the deal on the market. The joint venture may start working by the middle of 2010.
No Polish operator show interest in P4 takeover
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The largest mobile operators of Poland has not shown any interest in taking over smaller rival P4, if the company is put up for sale this year. Cyprus-based fund Tollerton Investments with 50.2 percent and Iceland-based fund Novator with 49.7 percent, the two shareholders of the telco set the sale of the business as an important priority in 2010 for the company’s managers.
The managers have been given stock options that can be cashed only if the company changes its owner and are expected to sell the company by this year. The managers also estimate the probability that the stock options will not be cashed this year at 30 percent.
Poland’s top mobile operator by revenue and market share Polkomtel and other Telekomunikacja Polska have not shown any plan to takeover P4. Even third-largest market participant Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa, owned by Deutsche Telekom has kept its reservations on the takeover plan.
Deutsche Telekom’s R&D chief will soon leave the company
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Chief Product and Innovation Officer, Christopher Schlaeffer, will leave Deutsche Telekom on 31 March 2010 on his own request to pursue fresh challenges. He is also the in charge of R&D within the group
and worked as the Corporate Development Officer from 2002 to 2006.
As a Chief Product and Innovation Officer, he looked after the product portfolio and the operational realisation of strategic areas of innovation such as IPTV, mobile Internet and digital services.
Telecom operators press for Brussel’s scrutiny
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: In order to to scrutinise the proposed merger of their UK mobile phone businesses, France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom are pressing for regulators in Brussels rather than London. The telecoms groups are
hopeful that European Commission’s inquiry would be shorter than one by UK competition authorities.
On the other hand, consumers feel that the proposed merger of France Telecom’s Orange UK and Deutsche Telekom’s T-Mobile UK, Britain’s third and fourth-largest mobile operators respectively will have a negative impact on the competition.
The two groups hope that Brussels will hold on to the case and the final say is of Brussels even if the UK authorities could ask the Commission to send the case to London. France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom are preparing the documents about the merger are under preparation and the companies may submit it to the Commission before Christmas, although it may not happen until January.
The length of the regulatory scrutiny will partly depend on whether France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom are willing to make concessions. Last month the two groups said they saw no need for major concessions, such as giving up valuable radio spectrum.
