Three days ahead of the launch of Mobile Number Portability, Aditya Birla group firm Idea Cellular on Monday started a helpline to guide over 700 million mobile users on various aspects of the service.
Successful bidders will have to pay 25 per cent of the amount upfront for sub 1 GHz, and 50 per cent upfront for higher frequency bands.
During the said period, the Consumer Complaints Council of ASCI found 15 advertisers, including Reliance Communications and Idea Cellular, fast moving consumer goods player Dabur and Elder Pharma and coaching centre Career Launcher, violating the council's code.
The GSM operators decided to withdraw their plea when the TDSAT was about to reserve its order on the maintainability of the petition after hearing the case for more than one-and-a-half hours.
The court asked Idea to transfer all the licences of Spice back to DoT.
The government on Tuesday invited financial bids from all the nine applicants, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Tata Teleservices and RCom, who had applied for participating in 3G spectrum auction.
Arbitrary decisions may have helped Bharti airtel and Idea Cellular get spectrum.
Leading telecom service provider Bharti Airtel has urged the government not to change existing spectrum allocation criteria and to continue with the additional 2G spectrum allocation policy based on subscriber figures.
The Department of Telecom may bar operators holding 3G airwaves from sharing the high-speed spectrum.
The government-appointed special auditors have found no major accounting discrepancy in Birlas-owned Idea Cellular, although they failed to get full details to assess additional liability.
Leading telecom players like RCom, Tatas, Vodafone and Idea Cellular failed to bag a single circle for Broadband services, saying the BWA spectrum price was too high to make a viable business case.
GSM operators on Monday stepped up pressure against the regulator's 2G recommendations, with Idea Cellular writing to the DoT and officials of Vodafone Essar calling on TRAI chief J S Sarma to convey their objections to the spectrum proposals.
Operators Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone-Essar, Aircel, Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd and Idea Cellular might have to fork out over Rs 11,200 crore for having spectrum beyond 6.2 MHz, if the government accepts the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) recommendations.
CDMA operators on Tuesday slammed a report of the DOT spectrum committee on airwave allocation, saying it is 'highly inclined' in favour of the GSM operators.
Its plans, to cut tariffs by 40% or offer more data, comes bundled with 1 GB high speed data for 28 days with unlimited voice thrown in.
The DoT is conducting a special audit on companies that have multiple licences -- mobile, international long distance, domestic long distance and internet service provider among others. Contractor, Nayak & Kishnadwala has been appointed to examine the books of Bharti Airtel, while S K Mehta & Co will check Vodafone-Essar's accounts. Varma & Varma has been appointed as auditors for Tata Teleservices, while Chhajed & Doshi will examine the books of Idea Cellular.
A large team led by Kumar Mangalam Birla has taken charge of the integration process.
Despite several high-profile cases of sexual harassment, Indian firms largely seem to be in denial. It's time they woke up to reality, but the whole issue is also a lot more complicated than it appears.
The books of these companies had come under a cloud after it was alleged that many of them had not been paying the goverment's share of revenue by showing the revenue earned under other categories. Under a suggestion of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, a special audit of all the integrated telecom companies will be undertaken once in 3-5 years.
The telecom tower-transmission business is going to see a shake-up with cash-rich and independent companies moving in with aggressive plans.
Vodafone has been recognised as the most admired mobile service brand online in India followed by Tata Indicom and Aircel, a survey said.
The new telecom players in the country, which had received licences in January 2008 and were subsequently allocated spectrum, are ready to roll out services in the next three to four months.
For example, Idea Cellular posted a 0.7 per cent decline in the average minutes of use per subscriber in the first quarter of the current financial year, partly because of the increasing use of multiple SIM cards. So, too, with Vodafone-Essar. The company admits a fall in usage per subscriber, as an increasing number utilised SIMs of more than one operator, particularly in the new circles.
Country's second largest telecom player Vodafone has launched Rs 5 per day scheme offering free incoming calls, cheaper outgoing calls and SMS rates during national roaming.
The case is likely to come up for hearing on Monday.
A total of 41 companies had applied for the permit
The Supreme Court in February, 2012 had quashed 122 2G licences.
As part of the service, UAE-based Indian immigrants can transfer money to their families based in India and the service would complement existing remittance channels and make transferring money internationally more affordable, Tata Communications said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange. In the first phase, this service would be extended to over 27 lakh subscriber base of mobile services operator Idea Cellular in Kerala.
Solicitor General of India Goolam Vahanvati has said no further allotment of spectrum beyond 6.2 MHz should be made to telecom operators till the report of the committee on its pricing and allocation is received.If the opinion is acted upon, it would affect companies like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone, Reliance Communications, Idea Cellular and Aircel, which have applied for extra spectrum in other circles.
Telecom major Bharti Group Chairman and Managing Director Sunil Bharti Mittal denied any attempt on forming a cartel with other telecom players to distort competition. Bharti Airtel had received a 'notice of enquiry' by anti- monopoly watchdog MRTPC. Vodafone Essar and Idea Cellular too had received such notices. It was alleged that 3 GSM operators, by colluding, have simultaneously increased the price. Mittal said that MVNOs will not work in India due to existing tariffs.
The department of telecommunication will soon write to companies, including Idea Cellular and Aircel to start landline operations.
BK Modi-promoted Spice Group and British Virgin Mobile have bid for MTNL's franchise deals to offer 3G services in Mumbai and Delhi.
Idea cellular trebled its share in the Mumbai market, albeit on a low base. RCom, for its part added five million (including GSM) subscribers during the month, numbers that have both surprised and confounded the market.
The division bench of Justices F I Rebello and D G Karnik on Monday reserved orders as to whether the Birla group's petition is admissible or not. The order will be passed on Tuesday. In the present case, the issue is whether the Birla group is liable to pay capital gains tax on the share-purchase transaction worth $150 million with AT&T Mauritius (subsidiary of AT&T).
The Department of Telecommunications' Wireless Planning and Coordination arm has moved a note to issue start-up spectrum of 4.4 MHz to four leading service providers offering GSM technology, whose applications have been pending from December 2006.
Idea Cellular, the GSM service provider of the Aditya Birla group, has roped in global telecom major Ericsson as equipment supplier for its GSM network in the Mumbai circle.
Members of COAI, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone-Essar, Idea Cellular and others met in New Delhi and decided to go ahead with filing of the affidavit in TDSAT against the Telecom Engineering Centre's report. COAI has also questioned the government's move to allocate spectrum to two telecom PSUs -- BSNL and MTNL -- saying they have been given frequency out of turn as many other players have been waiting to get spectrum for months and even years now.
BSNL had sought higher payment for minimum three years for the facilities provided to cell phone service providers -- BPL Mobile Cellular and Idea Cellular Ltd -- and email provider CG Faxemail (P) Ltd even if they had surrendered the right before the lapse of three years. A bench headed by Justice S B Sinha while upholding the telecom tribunal judgement that came down heavily on BSNL for revising rates unilaterally said: "We do not find that these appeals raise any substanti
As per the latest data released by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), Vodafone Idea -- born last year from the merger of older operators Vodafone India and Idea Cellular -- continues to be the largest operator with 38.75 crore consumers and 33.36 per cent market share in the wireless segment as on May 31, 2019.
