Vodacom launches low flat rates for Africa roaming (Africa)
Vodacom customers can expect huge roaming savings when travelling to 6 African countries where Vodacom and Vodafone operate. These countries include the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique and Tanzania. Vodacom is leveraging its presence and that of its parent company Vodafone in these African countries, to provide customers who travel to these countries with reduced rates applicable across the Vodacom and Vodafone networks.
The flat rates have resulted in roaming data rates being reduced by more than 70 per cent, from $ 2.2 per MB to only $ 0.64 per MB. In addition, roaming customers will also enjoy free incoming calls when they travel in these countries.
Commenting on the new Africa roaming service, Romeo Kumalo, Chief Commercial Officer at Vodacom said that they know that people want to remain connected whether they are at home or on holiday in Mozambique, and that nobody likes the headache of worrying about roaming bills. What they’re launching today is a solution to give their customers peace of mind when travelling. They now have one low roaming rate across our African family of networks and an especially aggressive data rate – just in time for the Easter holidays.
These rates are only applicable when roaming on the Vodacom Lesotho, Vodacom Mozambique, Vodacom Tanzania, Vodacom DRC, Vodafone Ghana and Safaricom Kenya networks. The reduced rates will automatically apply to all customers who are roaming on the networks above. Standard roaming rates will apply if roaming on a non Vodacom or Vodafone network in these countries.
Orange Armenia partners with MegaFon for revolutionary roaming service (Middle East)
Orange Armenia, subsidiary of France Telecom, together with MegaFon, one of the three largest Russian operators announced the start of a strategic partnership between two companies. Thanks to this new partnership Orange customers will benefit from unprecedented tariffs when roaming in Russia. In particular, when using the roaming service in MegaFon network, Orange Armenia customers will make and receive calls to and from Orange Armenia and MegaFon customers at a rate of only US$ 0.08.
Bruno Duthoit, Orange Armenia CEO, said that Orange is a powerful international player, and they are keen to provide customers with the best deals not only in Armenia, but also in roaming, specially for those countries they travel the most. Russia is one of the most popular destinations for Armenians, and they are happy today to offer the same tariff as for local calls in Armenia. Many Armenians, when they go to Russia, buy a SIM card of a local operator which generally has a very short lifetime, from several days to several weeks. From now on, customers will not need it and when leaving to Russia, they will feel themselves almost like home.
Konstantin Solodukhin, Deputy CEO for Development of National and International Long-Distance Communications, said on this occasion that for operators, the main factor for a successful roaming policy is having effective relationships with foreign partners, which will allow them to offer low rates for using mobile services abroad.
On MegaFon network Orange Armenia customers will have other advantages as well. The minute rate for all other incoming calls and for outgoing calls to other Russian operators will be $ 0.15, while calls to other operators’ customers in Armenia will be charged at $0.31 per min. Orange Armenia customers will also have an exclusive tariff for GPRS roaming charged at $0.23 per MB.
The exclusive roaming rates are available from April 1 to June 30.
Carlyle offers $6.5 Billion for Telecoms
The world’s second- largest private-equity firm, Carlyle Group has offered $6.5 billion for two telecom firms. Carlyle Group has agreed to pay $2.6 billion to take Syniverse Holdings Inc. private, in its second telecommunications buyout in as many days. The company has also offered $3.9 billion for CommScope.
Syniverse has announced that the all cash deal, which would pay $31 for each outstanding share of the firm, has already been approved by its board of directors and awaits shareholder approval. According to the company, it hopes that the deal, which represents a 35% premium above Syniverse’s Oct 26 closing price, would close by the end of the first quarter 2011. As in the CommScope deal, Syniverse will become a private company after its acquisition.
Syniverse provides mobile roaming, messaging and network technology to more than 800 mobile operators, cable and Internet providers in over 160 countries and on the other hand, CommScope provides wireless network hardware including antennas and cables.
The deal is scheduled to finalize on Dec. 5 and CommScope is free to find another buyer with a higher offer.
The two target companies appear to be at least partially complementary. Both Syniverse and CommScope are positioned to benefit from the new 4G rollouts planned by leading U.S. carriers including AT&T, Verizon Wireless, T-Mobile USA, and Sprint Nextel.
Mobile, global is aim of cell phone makers
JEJU, South Korea — Most mobile phones you buy in South Korea don’t work in Japan, while a phone bought in the United States may or may not work in Europe.
Consumers have long faced a perplexing alphabet soup of terminology involving disparate wireless technologies and radio frequencies when simply seeking to buy a phone to call business associates or loved ones from anywhere in the world.
The engineers of tomorrow’s mobile technology are hoping to change that.
At a forum last week sponsored by Samsung Electronics Co. on South Korea’s Jeju island, the architects of tomorrow’s wireless future — referred to as fourth-generation technology — discussed ways to help them meet the challenge of true worldwide mobile roaming.
Finding a common radio frequency that could be used anywhere in the world isn’t a simple task, given the current airwave clutter among cell phone, police radio, satellite and other wireless transmissions.
Studies are seeking to determine whether frequencies now in use by other technologies could be shared with new devices that would be able to sense when those channels are busy or free to transmit.
Another idea to free up frequencies would be to reallocate ones now given to obsolete technologies or those that don’t see heavy use.
Agreeing on a single global frequency would also be a key to allowing the new technology to work seamlessly worldwide.
“It’s essential this time that the fourth generation, whatever that means, is indeed a global technology,” said Alberto Ciarniello, a vice president at Telecom Italia SpA of Italy.
Consumers shouldn’t have to spend thousands of dollars for devices that can work with various competing technologies to be able to roam worldwide, said Ali Tabassi, a vice president from U.S.-based Sprint Nextel Corp.
But as is often the case with trailblazing technology, a potential format and frequency war is taking shape, along with a debate over how quickly the industry should move.
Some companies are supporting the technology known as Mobile WiMax, a burgeoning standard now coming into use that has been strongly backed by U.S. chip maker Intel Corp. It offers relatively fast connections over a long range, but not the kind of superfast speeds that are considered the realm of the fourth-generation future.
“We cannot wait for another three to four years for another technology platform to support the Internet-everywhere dream,” said Bin Shen, vice president for broadband at Sprint Nextel, which plans WiMax trials by late 2007 before launching the service in the United States in 2008. “We believe Internet is like air and oxygen in people’s lives in the future.”
There already are limited trials of Mobile WiMax under way in South Korea, with plans to cover the capital, Seoul, by early next year. However, in a sign of the difficulties in deploying a worldwide standard, the South Korean system uses a different frequency than the one planned for Sprint Nextel’s future network because of government restrictions.
Samsung has backed WiMax and is a partner in commercializing the technology in South Korea and the United States.
But at the same time, Samsung is using the forum to show off another potential next-generation technology. The South Korean company is one of several working to develop a standard for a lightning-speed data transmission that hasn’t yet been named and won’t be agreed upon until at least 2010, meaning it won’t be in consumers’ pockets for years.
Some say that’s too long to wait.
“Why can’t users today connect to the Internet everywhere they are?” asked Siavash Alamouti, chief technology officer for Intel’s mobile wireless division. “We’ve got to do it as fast as possible.”
Source- http://seattlepi.nwsource.com
Technorati : Japan, Mobile, Samsung, South Korea, WiMAX
Ice Rocket : Japan, Mobile, Samsung, South Korea, WiMAX
