TATA and BSNL enter Network Sharing deal (India)
Tata Teleservices Limited (TTSL), India’s fastest-growing pan India telecom service provider, today announced the signing of a landmark ‘Master Services Agreement for Passive Infrastructure Sharing’ with Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL).
Becoming the first Indian private telecom operator to enter into an agreement of this nature. The agreement which is valid for 15 years will be applicable to both Tata Teleservices Limited and Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) Limited in all of India’s 22 telecom Circles.
This is a moment of pride for us, as we have become the first private telecom operator to enter into such a strategically important agreement with BSNL, one that will allow us to expand our telecom footprint across the country much more quickly,†Mr Madhav Joshi, President, Legal and Regulatory Affairs, Tata Teleservices Limited, said.
The agreement comes at a very strategic time for Tata Teleservices Limited (TTSL) and Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) Limited (TTML), as both companies have been aggressively expanding their network presence on the CDMA side with Tata Indicom, while also rolling out GSM services under the TATA DOCOMO brand name. In the short space of just three months, we have already rolled out our GSM services in nine Circles—Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Orissa, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Mumbai, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh-Chhattisgarh and Haryana,†Mr AG Rao, Chief Technology Officer, Tata Teleservices Limited, said. This agreement has the potential to not just speed up our network expansion and rollout process, but would also have a substantial impact in terms of reduced costs,†he added.
Under the terms of the agreement, TTSL and TTML will have access to thousands of BSNL towers all across the country.
Bharti’s Q2 net seen up 63 pc on growth surge
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 26: Top Indian mobile services firm Bharti Airtel Ltd is expected to report on Friday a surge in quarterly profit as an expanding network and rock bottom rates snared users in the world’s fastest-growing mobile market.With 131 million GSM and CDMA users, the wireless base in Asia’s fourth-largest economy comfortably exceeds the combined populations of Germany and Spain.
Bharti, 30.8 per cent owned by Singapore Telecommunications Ltd, is forecast to announce a 63 per cent rise in consolidated profit to Rs 8.47 billion ($186.9 million) for the fiscal second quarter ending September, according to the median forecast of six analysts.
“Demand for mobile services is growing because competition has led to handsets becoming cheaper and companies have launched life-time prepaids to attract customers,” said Vinod Bansal, Director at Venimadhav Securities.
“This is one sector where growth has exceeded the most optimistic of estimates,” he said.
India is adding more than 6 million new mobile connections a month, rivalling China, and growth is expected to firm up as networks expand further into communication-starved rural areas where two-thirds of its 1.1 billion people live.
New Delhi-based Bharti, one of the earliest entrants in the sector, is likely to report higher earnings in the coming quarters with only 12 per cent of the population owning a mobile despite rapid growth.
Bharti added 3.99 million GSM users in the quarter, compared with 3.5 million who opted for its services during April-June.
Bharti, in which Vodafone Group Plc. also owns a nearly 10 per cent stake, said its mobile user base soared 92.3 per cent in the year to September, hitting 27.06 million in part due to the world’s lowest local mobile call rates.
Total customers, including fixed-line users, grew 81.9 per cent to 28.57 million.
BILLION DOLLAR BOSS
In August, Bharti awarded a $1 billion GSM equipment contract to Swedish telecoms gear maker Ericsson as a part of its ambitious nationwide expansion plans.
Bharti already has a network spanning all 23 zones that make up India’s telecom sector. Each zone is roughly equal to a big state like Maharashtra or a large city like New Delhi.
Bharti’s main competitors state-run Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd and Reliance Communications Ltd are also executing similar expansion plans to meet untapped demand in rural areas.
Earlier this month, unlisted BSNL, India’s largest telecoms firm by sales, gave an equipment contract worth an estimated $6.8 billion to Ericsson, Finnish giant Nokia and ITI Ltd to supply 63.5 million GSM lines.
Over a period of six months, Bharti has taken share away from BSNL which faced a capacity crunch due to soaring demand.
Bharti is run by entrepreneur Sunil Mittal, a billionaire, who has put India on the global telecoms map.
Mittal started out by making cycle parts and then importing Japanese generators into India. He diversified into telecoms services in the early 1990s when India’s economy was opened up.
His family also has interests in commercial agriculture and insurance.
Shares in Bharti rose 26.7 per cent in the past quarter handsomely outpacing the 17.4 per cent rise in the 30-issue benchmark BSE index, of which it is a part.
Source- http://www.financialexpress.com
