Bharti Airtel inks $400mn network deal with Nokia

Bharti Airtel has signed an estimated $400 million contract with Nokia to expand its networks in 8 Airtel circles and deploy WAP solutions across its pan-India networks.

As per the three year contract, Nokia will provide managed services and expand Airtel's SM/GPRS/EDGE networks in Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat, Bihar (including Jharkhand), Orissa, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh (including Chattisgarh), according to an official release issued by Airtel to the BSE today.

The network monitoring operations will be carried out from Nokia’s Global Network Services Center in Chennai. Nokia will also deploy its WAP solution across Airtel’s national network to enhance its mobile packet core network capabilities.

"Our network leadership across India is a critical driver in the Bharti Airtel success story. Our partnership with Nokia reinforces our commitment to this cause and Nokia will provide us the latest technology and expertise to drive growth in Eastern India and rapidly expand our coverage in western India, Manoj Kohli, president of Bharti Airtel, said.

DoT seeks ministry’s opinion on BSNL’s service surveillance plea

The department of telecommunications (DoT) has sought legal opinion from the law ministry regarding the application of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) for unified access service licence for Delhi and Mumbai circles.

Sources said DoT had asked for advice on whether granting a unified access licence to BSNL would be in conformity with the provision that a service provider does not hold more than 10% in another company in the same circle.

Since the government holds 100% of BSNL and 56.25% in Mahanagar Telephone Nigam (MTNL), which provides basic and cellular services in Delhi and Mumbai, a legal opinion is necessary before the licence application is processed, sources said.

BSNL has sought licences for the two circles stating that since MTNL does not have a UASL licence but separate basic and cellular licences in Delhi and Mumbai, legally BSNL should be granted a UASL. According to BSNL officials, the 10% provision applies in case of UASL licences. Apprehending that using the same logic, MTNL would seek licences for other circles, especially metros like Kolkata and Chennai, BSNL has intimated DoT that it has no objections if MTNL is granted such licences in lieu of it being given licence for Delhi and Mumbai.

These circles are crucial for BSNL’s growth at this stage as they account for about 30% of India's mobile market.

India's First IPTV Service from MTNL

Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Limited (MTNL) and IOL Broadband have rolled-out India's first IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) service. IOL Broadband has entered into a strategic partnership with MTNL for providing Content Delivery Network.

IPTV is a system wherein digital quality television service is delivered to consumers using Broadband connection. According to IOL sources, IPTV services are gaining tremendous momentum world-wide, since the beginning of 2006, and this roll-out is poised to bring India into the bracket of technically advanced countries, while making next generation entertainment services available in the country.

It is estimated that already 2 million IPTV connections have been booked world-wide. The subscriber base is expected to reach 10 million by year 2007. MTNL will offer IPTV services to its existing 2.2 million subscribers in Mumbai in the first phase.

With IPTV, subscribers can control and choose hundreds of TV channels, Real Time Interactive TV, Video on Demand, Music on Demand, Pause and Play, Time Shifted Television Viewing, and e-Learning, along with excellent picture quality and superior sound effects.

A S Oberai, director, IOL Broadband, said, "IPTV is the technology where the consumers can access phone, Internet, and television services through a single cable. With this paradigm shift, the focus will be shifted from conventional driven entertainment to consumer demand entertainment. IPTV is going to replace traditional methods of viewing television soon. MTNL has 2.2 million customers already, and we are privileged to work hand in hand with them. We are also looking at other cities soon."

From October 21, MTNL is launching IPTV for its broadband customers, who have to pay Rs 199 a month to get 25 free-to-air channels. MTNL plans to increase the number of channels to over 200 later. Users have to buy a separate set top box (STB) to get IPTV, which would cost them in the region of Rs 6,000.

IOL Broadband is India's first IPTV service provider to demonstrate a fully workable IPTV solution. IOL Broadband has advanced IP based Next Generation Network (IP-NGN). With enriched content, comprising the best of television, movies from Bollywood, from Hollywood, from Warner Bros, MGM, Universal, 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures, etc, this content will be compressed by the world s best and latest technology standard MPEG-4 H.264 (Part 10), and will be streamed to customers on 1.8 to 2.5 Mbps bandwidth.

IOL Broadband rolls out IPTV, allots 16 lakh shares

Mumbai City-based IOL Broadband Ltd on Saturday, said it has rolled out its first IPTV service in the city and has allotted 16 lakh equity shares to shareholders.

The company rolled out the country's first IPTV service in Mumbai with leading telecom major Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL). IOL Broadband entered into strategic partnership with MTNL for providing content delivery network, the company informed the Bombay Stock Exchange.

IOL Broadband also allotted 16 lakh equity shares of Rs 10 each at a premium of Rs 79 per share, in terms of the special resolution passed by the shareholders on September 29, it added.

Tendering process for GSM lines transparent : BSNL

State-owned BSNL asserted that its tendering process for adding 45.5 million GSM lines was absolutely transparent and said the evaluation process for the financial bids would be completed in the next one month.

"The process of evaluation and finalisation will be completed in a month and we expect the first line to be operational by March 2007," BSNL CMD A K Sinha said.

Asked about the reasons for disqualifying US major Motorola and Chinese company ZTE, Sinha said it was purely on technical ground but declined to elaborate saying the matter was subjudice.

"We shall reply to the Delhi High Court's notice within the time stipulated and we shall give all the details in that," he said.

In the financial bids, which were opened on Monday, Swedish telecom major Ericsson had emerged the lowest bidder followed by Nokia to supply equipment estimated at a cost of over Rs 20,000 crore to BSNL for its mega expansion of mobile services project.

If selected after the due process of evaluation, Ericsson would be awarded 60 per cent of the contract while Nokia the remaining 40 per cent for 45.5 million lines expansion.

Sinha said BSNL has long term relations with all the vendors be it Motorola, ZTE or any other and ruled out any possibility of having any bias against or for any body.

One of the reasons for disqualifying Motorola and ZTE was that these vendors did not have experience of deploying a big network of 20 million lines.

Idea Cellular launches service in Rajasthan

Idea Cellular announced the launch of its services in Rajasthan.

“One of the fastest-growing telecom operators in India, Idea Cellular offers innovative services and a superior network coverage. The launch of Idea in Rajasthan ushers in a new era in mobile services and provides the best choice to customers,” a company official said.

He said Idea’s state-of-the-art services would cover the entire state in two phases, ensuring that residents and visitors remained connected locally, nationally and internationally.

In Phase 1, Idea will cover 145 towns and villages including Jaipur, Kota, Udaipur, Ajmer, Alwar, Ganganagar, Bhilwara and major highways like Delhi-Jaipur, Jaipur-Ajmer and Ajmer-Udaipur.

In Phase 2, it will cover 70 additional towns and villages, major highways and corridors.

Idea will offer services like GPRS and MMS, ring tones, MusiCard – sing along service like Karaoke, etc.

Idea recently launched services in Himachal Pradesh and was also slated to do so in UP (East), President and CEO Vikram Mehmi said. Idea Cellular has the licence to operate in 11 circles.

With a customer base of over 10 million, Idea Cellular has operations in Delhi, Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Uttaranchal, Haryana, UP (West), Kerala and Himachal Pradesh.

Reliance Communications launches Mobile Blogging

You are vacationing in an exotic locale and you want to share the delightful moment with your friends and family. Relax! You can communicate your feelings of the whole scenario by posting them from your mobile phones. Reliance Communications, India’s largest integrated telecommunications service provider has the answer for bloggers. Sharing one’s thoughts and pictures with the world is all set to go mobile with Reliance’s maiden launch of its mobile blogging service – Mblog.



“The community of bloggers in India is growing and we want to ensure that pictures taken on mobiles are just not left in the phones. They can now be shared through mobile blogging and we are quite optimistic that millions of our users will make use of this powerful medium. Mobile phones are very convenient and outnumber PC or Internet users in India and lends nicely to community networking. Moreover mobile blogging is simple, easier and it's faster,” said Mahesh Prasad, President, Application Solutions and Content Group, Reliance Communications.



Reliance Communications’ legion of subscribers can now transmit images, videos and their thoughts with a group of friends or with everyone on the World Wide Web by posting the content on the Internet from their mobile phones. Reliance Communications is the first telecom service provider in India to provide mobile blogging service on a pan-India basis without any cumbersome registration process. The company has partnered with the Hyderabad based mobile content provider –IMI Mobile for providing this service.



To avail of this new service, Reliance Communications’ subscribers have to MMS/SMS their text, pictures or videos to 1234. A return SMS specifies the subscriber password and the website URL for the blog. One can have a ‘buddy list’ specifically from the subscribers phonebook, including both Reliance and non-Reliance subscribers. Every time there’s a blog posted by the user, the ‘buddy list’ gets an SMS alert informing them to check out the blog on the specified URL.

To view the blog, one has to visit www.reliancecommunications.co.in/mblog and key in their password. The buddy list can be managed by visiting the website or alternatively through the messaging section of Reliance World. Subscribers who don’t have MMS or video capable handsets can send a text blog through an SMS to 1234 with the keyword mblog followed by the text posting. A nominal fee of Rs 5 will be charged per MMS blog and Rs. 3 per SMS blog.



Reliance Mobile World has gained popularity as a one-stop-shop for entertainment, communication, gaming and m-commerce. Thanks to the wide range of applications it has endeared itself to users from all walks of life. Reliance Mobile World’s applications include mobile TV, videos, cricket updates, music, ringtones, m-commerce, mobile mail, messaging, city and TV guides, railway reservations, banking, bill payment and examination results.

Motorola, ZTE disqualified on technical grounds: BSNL

State-owned telecom firm BSNL said on Thursday that Motorola and ZTE were disqualified from the tender for setting up over 45 million cellular line infrastructure on technical grounds.

Top BSNL officials said that the two companies, of which Motorola has moved the Delhi High Court against the disqualification, did not meet various technical requirements.

"One of the reasons was that the tender conditions required prospective vendors for experience of (setting up) 20 million GSM lines, which Motorola did not have.

So the tender evaluation committee disqualified them," said BSNL finance director SD Saxena at a press conference on Thursday to announce the reduction in STD call rates.

Saxena declined to go into greater details saying the matter was in the court. He, however, said Motorola and ZTE were not disqualified because of the China connection and any security concerns, as reported in the media.

"We still do business with companies like ZTE," he added. ZTE is a Chinese firm. Motorola, on the other hand, is a US firm but does not make telecom switches.

BSNL cuts fixed line tariffs

Facing stiff competition from private operators, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited on Thursday reduced fixed line tariffs for its subscribers paying a monthly rental of Rs.180 or above. The reduction, effective from November 1, is likely to benefit more than one crore landline subscribers.

Under the new scheme, all subscribers paying a monthly rental of Rs.180 or more will be given the benefits of OneIndia tariff plans — STD calls at Re.1 a minute and local calls (of three-minute duration) also at Re.1. Also, the number of free calls has been doubled to 50 every month.

Hoping that the "festival bonanza" would stop BSNL subscribers from surrendering landline phones, Chairman and Managing Director A.K. Sinha said: "People who spend around Rs. 400 every month on mobile would shift to the new cheaper and attractive plan, while for the existing subscribers, it is a good news." Interestingly, BSNL, which has around 3.5 lakh subscribers, recently reduced the monthly rental of the OneIndia plan from Rs. 225 to 180.

STD cheaper

The new scheme will make calls within a State (intra-circle) cheaper by 16 per cent (from Rs. 1.20 to Re. 1 a minute), while STD rates will see a reduction of more than 50 per cent. BSNL has also decided to increase the local call PCO pulse duration from 45 to 60 seconds with the call rate of Re.1 a minute.

Reacting to a controversy over the tendering process for adding 45.5 million GSM lines, Mr. Sinha said the entire process was being carried out transparently.

The evaluation process for financial bids would be completed in one month. Pointing out that the first phase of the Rs. 20,000-crore project would be operational by March 2007, he said disqualification of Motorola of the U.S. and ZTE of China was purely on "technical ground".

Work on laying undersea cable between India and Singapore in collaboration with Mahanagar Telecom Nigam Limited would be awarded in the next two months. BSNL declared a dividend of Rs. 1,175 crore for 2005-06 and posted about 24 per cent increase in the operating profit at Rs. 8,270 crore in the period. It registered a 11.13 per cent increase in the revenue during the year at Rs. 40,177 crore, and added 82 lakh lines, including 77 lakh new cellular subscribers.

BSNL moves TDSAT over TRAI directive on roaming charges

Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), the state-owned telecom service major, has moved the Telecom Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) challenging telecom regulator TRAI's directive that there would be no additional revenue share between operators on roaming calls.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) had, on September 11, passed a regulation prohibiting additional revenue share for roaming calls on applications received by some private cellular operators. TRAI had pegged roaming charges for all types of calls at the prevailing rate of 30 paise per minute.

A TDSAT bench headed by Justice Arun Kumar accepted the petition and issued notices to TRAI and directed it to file a reply within two weeks. The bench also directed TRAI not to take any coercive steps against BSNL till November 17, the next date of hearing.

It also held that there was no need by the private operators to pay any additional interconnect charge on roaming calls.

BSNL has come out with its own scheme for this additional revenue share over and above the prescribed termination charge for terminating the roaming calls in its network. However, the regulator said the charges are cost-based and as per IUC regulation

"The prescribed termination charge is cost-based, independent of the network from where the call is originating / terminating and also independent of the tariff charged by the operators," the TRAI said.

Ericsson set to get BSNL deal, Motorola goes to court

The bidding process for a tender by state-owned firm BSNL for rolling out 60 million line cellular network worth about $6.5 billion (Rs 30,738 crore) came under a cloud on Monday.

One of the infrastructure equipment vendors, Motorola moved Delhi High Court for being disqualified from financial bidding on technical grounds.

Although Motorola did not get a stay on opening of financial bids and evaluation excercise, the entire rocess has come under a cloud and outcome would depend on court orders. BSNL has been given two weeks to file reply.

Besides, PMO has sought clarifications from DoT on the tender, raising issues related to transparency. Some reports quoted a letter as saying that tender specifications have been repeatedly changed to protect interest of some foreign firms.

It said, "Several informal instructions have been issued to the BSNL from senior levels in the ministry and there are apprehensions that the tender may have been finalised in a not very transparent manner."

Industry official said Ericsson emerged as the lowest bidder (L1) at around $109 per line cost, followed by Nokia which bid about $175. Under the terms, L1 would get 60% of order, while L2 (Nokia) would get rest 40%.

The split between the two companies would be for about 45 million lines (for which the tender was floated).

One-third of order for 60 million lines, has been reserved for ITI. It has partnership with Alcatel. ITI-Alcatel will have to match Ericson's L1 bid.

The other bidder was Siemens, whose cellular infrastructure business has been bought over by Nokia, keeping two players in the bidding. About 25-50% of the network would be for 3G (third generation) services.

On Monday, although the high court did not grant a stay on the process, the division bench of acting Chief Justice Vijender Jain and Justice Kailash Gambhir issued notices to the Centre and BSNL for November 2. They said further process shall be subject to the outcome of the petition.

BSNL had disqualified Motorola's participation in the bidding process on October 7. Appearing for BSNL, additional solicitor general Gopal Subramanium justified his client's decision stating it was on technical grounds.

He said the BSNL committees had found there were major deviations from the tender specification in case of Motorola. "Alongwith ZTE, Motorola were eliminated as they failed to meet the stringent technical criteria."

Motorola has accused BSNL of being arbitrary and illegal. Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Motorola, said.

"The bidders who did not provide required undertakings by scheduled timeline have been invited for opening of the financial bid whereas Motorola had submitted its undertakings within stipulated time. But BSNL did not call the company for bidding," Rohatgi said.

Qualcomm sees domestic manufacture boosting 3G

A mobile phone bundled with a connection for Rs. 1,500 or even Rs. 1,000 and a third generation (3G) phone capable of high bandwidth data connectivity for Rs. 5,000 are "definitely achievable" in the near future with Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technology.

The lowering of prices is made possible, says Qualcomm, a CDMA technology major that owns a plethora of patents, by the business model that it follows. It licenses a variety of handset manufacturers and encourages innovation in technology development by even students. This approach will help in rapid growth of CDMA in the 3G era, says Kanwalinder Singh, President, India and SAARC region, Qualcomm.

"It has gone to Rs.1,999 and it is not far away from Rs.1,500 at a wholesale level," Mr. Singh said in reply to a question on entry-level CDMA handsets bundled with connections.

It is erroneous to cast the mobile phone technology debate purely in terms of Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) versus CDMA because there are migratory paths created by Qualcomm for GSM operators to move to 3G.

The focus now has to be, according to Mr. Singh, on early adoption of the recommendations issued by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on licensing of 3G operations, as this was critical to bridge the digital divide.

Broadband data communications made possible by 3G will enable new services in education, healthcare and agriculture development.

The potential for high volume data transmission has been exploited for telemedicine by countries such as Brazil, Australia and South Korea.

"We would like to see quick adoption of TRAI's recommendations on licence policy, clearing of spectrum and pricing mechanism for the industry to move forward. There is a lot of work to be done and devices to be produced," Mr. Singh said. Qualcomm will work closely with operators to ensure that its 3G technologies, EV-DO and WCDMA are available to rural communities. Both fixed wireless phones and mobile phones will play a part in expanding voice and data connectivity.

Claiming Qualcomm's business model of licensing handset and hardware manufacture to be superior to that of dominant GSM companies (which license third parties but also themselves compete in the manufacture of networks, chipsets and handsets), Mr. Singh cited the example of sub-50 dollar handsets. There are 10 suppliers in this category for CDMA with 22 models, compared to five suppliers for GSM with 17 models.

Qualcomm's licensing of Himachal Futuristic Communication Limited to make 3G handsets is expected to lead to lower prices.

Handset prices of Wideband CDMA (WCDMA), a technology that is expected to grow in the next three years, have been going down steadily.

Asked whether CDMA technologies could grow significantly when GSM has a market share of a reported 82 per cent worldwide, Mr. Singh said Qualcomm was the innovator in two variants of 3G, CDMA 2000 and WCDMA. "CDMA 2000 is already deployed by Tata, Reliance and BSNL. WCDMA is the migration path for the GSM players," he added.

As GSM players evolve to WCDMA and then grow, it is not unrealistic to expect that India will follow the global track of getting to about 60 per cent market share. Half of the subscriber base from GSM will go to CDMA. This is a very healthy ecosystem to be in.

The debate about the differences between GSM and CDMA and individual operators shifting to GSM is not important. The world is moving to one of these variants, says Qualcomm.

CDMA players support TRAI's recommendations

Telecom regulator TRAI's recent recommendations on spectrum allocation for starting next generation 3G mobile services, which drew flak from GSM operators, today got obvious support from rival CDMA players.

The recommendations are consistent with the fair and transparent manner for allocating the scarce spectrum, the CDMA Development Group (CDG) said in a statement here.

However, the group said the policy of allocating spectrum for 2G (existing) mobile services is "subjective" and asked the telecom regulator to make it consistent with its recent recommendations on allocating 3G spectrum.

By subjectively allocating 2G spectrum on an incremental basis based on an operator's reported subscriber numbers and a dated spectrum efficient analysis, CDMA operators are constrained to only half of the amount of spectrum available to GSM operators, it said.

Earlier this week, TRAI had suggested a maximum of Rs 80 crore as base price for acquisition of spectrum to start 3G mobile services in category 'A' circles, Delhi and Mumbai, Rs 40 crore for category 'B' circles and metro Chennai and Kolkata and Rs 15 crore for category 'C' circles.

Since the spectrum is scarce and number of operators are more TRAI has suggested bidding route for 3G spectrum over and above the base price.

The spectrum for immediate allocation in case of 3G services should be in 450 MHz, 800 MHz and 2.1 GHz, TRAI had said.

Cellular operators association COAI had said TRAI recommendations are in favour of CDMA players.

Maran wants 4 months to implement FDI norms

The Communications Ministry is understood to have sought time till February 2, 2007 for implementing guidelines that permit up to 74% FDI in the telecom sector instead of the December 31 deadline set by the government.

According to highly placed sources, Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran has sought the time to enable resolution of inter-ministerial differences and addressing issues concerning telecom operators, particularly the security aspect, and different set of rules for firms with FDI up to 49% and those with FDI between 49-74%.

Sources said the issue could go to the empowered group of ministers on FDI headed by Defence Minister Pranab Mukharjee for early resolution of the differences.

The original Press Note 5 that laid out the FDI guidelines for the telecom sector was issued in November last year with four months time for companies to abide by the norms. Having failed to ensure compliance, the government gave two subsequent extensions of three months each.

This is the fourth time that an extension has been granted, but its duration will be clear only after the notification is issued.

BSNL reduces landline Tariff

The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited(BSNL) announced cut in landline rentals and several other reductions in charges like the cost of SIM card for pre-paid cell phone connection.

This announcement was made by AP Circle General Manager R K Arnold, on the eve of its seventh anniversary today. He told newsmen that the rentals have been reduced from Rs 90 and Rs 160 to Rs 75 and Rs 120, respectively per month. Paying advance rent will attract a discount of two months rent to the consumers, he said.

He announced unlimited free calls in their respective cities in BSNL network, for land lines and WLL phones in Hyderabad, Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam, against Rs 399 monthly rental plan. Rs 599 monthly rental plan enables such free calls through out the state and Rs 899 rental plan allows such free calls to cell phones also.

FOr those who takes land line connections in October, there would be reduction in two months rent of Rs 250 and facility to pay Rs 1,000 security deposit infive instalments.

BSNL announced setting up of free phones at all governmetn hospitals for patients and their attendants usage. Already such facility is available at airports. In future such facility will be extended to bus stations and railway stations.

For CellOne consumers, the monthly Exile prepaid SIM card price was reduced from Rs 224to Rs 112. On the eve of Dasara and Diwali, BSNL announced grace period for prepaid card would be extended from seven days to 15 days and reduction of post paid activation charge from Rs 200 to Rs 100.

The CellOne connectivity reached 14 lakh in the state, by issuing one lakh more connections in September month alone and expected to reach 15 lakh this year. Soon BSNL proposing to provided Rs 3,600 free talk time to the purchasers of Motorola and Nokiya handset.

High speed internet facility would be provided soon for a nominal monthly rental of Rs 140. In 1000-lines exchanges at rural areas, BSNL offering Rs 2160 free calls for two years against one time payment of Rs 1200. There would be no security deposit and installation charges.