'Considering that an Internet company's market value is largely determined by its direct access to consumers for digital services, and largely served outside a sovereign country's control, it would appear reasonable in trade terms to discuss fees for a seat at the proverbial 'table' of opportunities in the largest open consumer market,' argues Venki Nishtala.
Titan, IndusInd Bank, Axis Bank, State Bank of India, Power Grid, NTPC and Tata Motors were among the among the major gainers. Mahindra & Mahindra, Larsen & Toubro, Nestle, JSW Steel, Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services, Tech Mahindra and Maruti were the major laggards.
According to sources in the know, Anil Ambani-led RCom will be providing all infrastructure - towers, fibre, backhaul as well as its national and international long distance facilities-- to RIL's high-speed broadband services.
The mobile number portability will be delayed by at least three months from its scheduled implementation date as the telecom regulator is still busy preparing regulations for the new system.
The company said that intense competition following the disruptive entry of a new player, legal and regulatory challenges, high level of unsustainable debt and increased losses had together caused significant "negative business and reputational impact".
The telecom companies have also been asked to urgently improve their infrastructure, as the government aims to digitise a host of services.
The telecom major at present has footprints in MP-CG, Punjab, Haryana, UP-East, UP-West, Gujarat and Bihar circles.
The latest ad, done by O&M again, Vodafone's ad agency, shows two engineers tinkering away in a dimly-lit highway tunnel.
Tejas Networks, a telecom and network firm, on Thursday said an arm of Tata Sons will acquire controlling stake in it for nearly Rs 1,890 crore in a multi-step deal. The company has executed definitive agreements with Panatone Finvest, a subsidiary of Tata Sons (Tata group holding firm), it said in a statement. As part of the agreement, the company will make a preferential allotment of 1.94 crore equity shares at a price per equity share of Rs 258 per share aggregating to Rs 500 crore to Panatone.
Raising the issue of net neutrality, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday sought suspension of Question Hour in Lok Sabha and gave a notice for an adjournment motion to discuss the matter immediately.
Joining the rush of companies looking for spectrum, BPL Mobile has applied for a unified access service licence in 21 of the country's 23 telecom circles.
The consolidated revenue increased 20 per cent to Rs 8,422 cr
Telecom operators have to take double confirmation from consumers before activating value added services (VAS) and must complete de-activation requests in four hours, sectoral regulator Trai said.
Rs 3,050-crore penalty on Airtel, Voda Idea gets nod. Final decision will be taken by DoT.
India may have achieved a teledensity of over 65 per cent, but as many as 62,443 villages are still to get a taste of telecom revolution that started since 1995-96, says the Economic Survey 2010-11.
The Department of Telecom has slashed performance and financial bank guarantee requirement of telecom operators by 80 per cent, according to a licence amendment note issued on Wednesday. Under the amended norms, telecom operators will be required to provide a performance bank guarantee of up to Rs 44 crore for each service for the telecom licence compared to Rs 220 crore mandated under the old rule.
Reliance Industries (RIL's) annual report released on Sunday highlighted the company's focus on new energy solutions, with chairman and managing director (MD) Mukesh Ambani stating that the age of fossil fuels will not continue much longer. RIL has sought shareholders' approval to give Ambani another five-year term as MD till 2029 at nil salary. The recently demerged Jio Financial Services, which "will leverage the prowess of digital and retail businesses", was expected to be listed soon.
The communications ministry is of the view that telecom tariffs in India can fall further to almost half their current levels - with local intra-circle calls for 25 paise and nationwide long distance calls for 50 paise - provided new operators are allowed to start services.
The first step you need to take is link your mobile number to Aadhaar.
Aiming to provide seamless state-of-the-art communication network, RailTel - the telecom arm of railways - will launch Railwire, a high capacity broadband service, in rural and remote areas of the country.
Reliance Jio has suggested an alternative plan to the The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) under which spectrum required by non-geostationary orbit satellite (NGSO) operators to run their gateway terminals should be auctioned geographically, based on districts, rather than circles as done for mobile services. For spectrum which would be required to connect user terminals (like individual homes), Jio has suggested it should be auctioned frequency-wise and exclusively to an operator at a pan-India level. The move is significant as the auctioning of satellite space spectrum has been vehemently opposed by low earth orbit satellite operators (satellites which circle at low altitudes of 200-2000 km).
Reliance Jio Infocomm is the only company which had in 2010 won a pan-India spectrum for 4G services but is yet to start commercial services.
The Home Ministry had asked the department of telecommunication to ensure access to all encrypted data, including that of international players such as Blackberry, Skype and even Gmail.
"Network quality is the most important consideration for Indians when it comes to selecting a service provider. But the fact is Indians don't really know which service provider has the best network in their circle, all they know or to be more precise are told by the service providers is how much lower their prices are when compared to the competition," it said in a statement.
Every third Indian today owns a phone connection, thanks to a number of steps taken by the government to foster affordable telecom services.
Bharti Airtel is learnt to be considering a bid for South African telecom firm MTN, which has operations in over 20 countries. If successful, it will catapult the company into the league of top global telecom players.
More and more women are making their presence felt in jobs related to sciences, technology, and engineering across organisations.
A detailed investigation done by the NIA and other security agencies indicated that over 40 virtual SIM cards were used in the Pulwama attack alone, and there are probably more of them floating in the cyberspace of the valley.
Letter to telecom secretary alleges Jio is masquerading full-blown services in the guise of a trial; no word from Reliance.
The Securities and Exchange Board of India's (Sebi's) technical advisory committee has been mandated to probe the trading halt at National Stock Exchange (NSE) and fix accountability. The committee after a detailed examination would send its findings and recommendations to whole-time member Madbhi Puri Buch, to decide the future course of action, said two people in the know. The panel, which is currently chaired by Ashok Jhunjhunwala of IIT Madras, is learnt to have sought an explanation over two key issues from NSE: One on the effectiveness of interoperability as it was unable to migrate the trading positions; the other on laxity in switching it to the disaster recovery site.
Reliance Jio retained its top position with the highest average data download speed of 21.9 megabit per second among 4G service providers in October, according to the latest data published by telecom regulator Trai. However, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea network have been continuously recording an increase in data download speed thereby reducing the gap with the Jio network. After a marginal dip in 4G data download speed, the Jio network in October resumed the speed level of 21.9 mbps it had recorded in June, while Airtel and Vodafone Idea (VIL) have registered close to two and half times jump in data download speed on their network.
The 78-year-old Naveen is on the cusp of creating history. He must win the forthcoming Assembly polls to become India's longest-serving chief minister, a record held by Sikkim's Pawan Kumar Chamling.
WhatsApp will not delete any account for not accepting its new privacy update, but users not agreeing to the controversial terms after "several weeks" will not be able to access their chat list, and eventually, will not be able to answer incoming phone or video calls over the app.
Companies might have to shell out a fourth of the industry's annual net revenue to clear the obligation
Debt-ridden telecom operator Vodafone Idea on Tuesday approved the allotment of equity shares worth Rs 16,133 crore to the government, which post-allocation has become the largest shareholder with a 33.44 per cent stake in the company. The shares have been allocated to the government in lieu of conversion of interest dues arising from deferment of adjusted gross revenue and spectrum auction payments, the company said in a regulatory filing. "...it is hereby informed that the board of directors of the company has, at its meeting held today approved the allotment of 16,133,198,899 equity shares of face value of Rs 10 each at an issue price of Rs 10 per equity share aggregating to Rs 161,331,848,990 to the Department of Investment and Public Asset Management, Government of India," the filing said.
On Monday, the ministry issued two orders, one directing video sharing platform YouTube to block the 20 channels and the other, for blocking of the news websites.
The income tax department has found alleged manipulation of account books for reducing taxable income in India by Chinese telecom company Huawei whom it raided recently, sources said on Thursday. The searches were conducted on February 15 at the main business and residential premises of "key office bearers" of a multi-national group, engaged in distribution of telecom products and providing captive software development services, the CBDT said in a statement. Sources identified the company as Huawei.
It has suggested OTTs be subject to the same security requirements that a traditional TSP has to adhere to.
While in all, 15 entities owe the government Rs 1.47 lakh crore -- Rs 92,642 crore in unpaid licence fee and another Rs 55,054 crore in outstanding spectrum usage charges, it is not immediately clear just how much of that has been sought by the government by midnight.
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