'The expeditious enactment of labour codes and strategic measures to bridge the skills jobs gap are critical.'
The Department of Telecom on Monday said it would hold consultations with various operators on the issue of foreign direct investment but denied that the FDI issue was in any way linked to unified licencing regime.
On Monday, Attorney General R Venkataramani, appearing for the Centre, mentioned an interim application before a bench of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justice J B Pardiwala.
Nearly 20 lakh jobs will be up for grabs for those having skill such as IoT, mobility solutions, telecom infrastructure, network architectures, sales among others.
It's difficult to say whether the CBI will find enough proof against telecom minister A Raja or whether it will get caught in the parcel of half-truths he's been dishing out on how he's just followed the recommendations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India and the actions of his predecessors.
The entire Opposition in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday was one against the hike in telecom rates but failed to elicit any assurance of a rollback from Telecom Minister Arun Shourie.
Reliance Jio has sent a second legal opinion to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) on the subject of the potential allocation of satellite spectrum. The letter is written by retired Supreme Court Justice L Nageshwara Rao and argues in favour of auctions, stating that any other method for allocating spectrum apart from auctions could be constitutionally unsound. Business Standard has reviewed the letter.
With the import bill of telecom equipment rising, the government on Wednesday said preferential treatment would be given to its indigenous production in the New Telecom Policy, which is under formulation.
'I feel more like a chess player, thinking for long hours how to make the next move," Telecom Secretary Aruna Sundararajan tells Surajeet Das Gupta.
Six months after an infrastructure deal with brother Anil Ambani, Mukesh Ambani has now joined hands with Sunil Mittal.
Internet major Google will make the Pixel series of smartphones in India and they will become available from 2024 onward, a senior company official said on Thursday. Google senior vice president for devices and services, Rick Osterloh, said the company will partner with international contract manufacturers to make the phones in India.
Though the multi-crore 2G scam had come to light last year, it was 2011 which was action-packed as Raja, telecom ministry officials along with many high-profile business heads were put behind the bars for their alleged involvement in the case.
Under the pact, Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries' telecom arm will hire nationwide optical fibre network of Reliance Communications for the roll-out of 4G services.
The wise men who formulated the National Telecom Policy 999 broke the vertically integrated National Telecom Network into three segments, i.e., Access (Fixed and Mobile), National Long Distance and International Long Distance. This has resulted in a dramatic reduction in tariffs and improvement of Quality of Service.
The department of telecom will issue guidelines on raising the foreign direct investment limit to 74 per cent from 49 per cent next week.
Telecom companies with cases pending before the Telecom Dispute Settlement and Appellate Tribunal or those hoping to file new ones would be advised to hurry.
Indian telecom seems to be getting back on its feet.
The attached properties include 14 assets of Tuteja worth Rs 15.82 crore, 115 properties of Anwar Dhebar, the elder brother of Raipur Mayor and Congress leader Aijaz Dhebar, worth Rs 116.16 crore, properties of Vikash Agarwal alias Subbu worth Rs 1.54 crore and 33 properties of Arvind Singh worth Rs 12.99 crore, it said in a statement.
Call drops may end as govt allows telecom spectrum trading
The Cellular Operators Association of India has suggested that the government, in allocating telecom licence, consider applicants with experience and impose a five-year lock-in period under which promoters cannot sell their equity.
The mistrust between the authorities and service providers can end if the contentious issues are addressed as a package deal.
The government has issued a stern warning to telecom companies to put the required security system for Blackberry services in place within 15 days or stop the services. The directive has been issued to the respective service providers to work out with officials of Blackberry licensor Research in Motion (RIM) of Canada to provide full-proof security system in the country. Currently, Bharti Airtel, Vodafone-Essar, BPL Mobile and Reliance are offering this premium service.
The Delhi circle licence will be available in the efficient 900 MHz spectrum, which is why Videocon is interested.
The new telecom policy-2011 is also expected to come out with new norms for mergers and acquisitions, enhancing rural coverage, and spectrum allocation, among other things.
According to software company Mavernir, the new virtualised networks would lead to a saving of 40 per cent in capex and 34 per cent in terms of lower operations cost for operators.
The rush to enter the world's fastest-growing mobile services market has attracted a wide range of applicants for telecom licences with the Department of Telecommunications.
Telecom services across the country could suffer, with the Department of Telecom ready to recall over 2,200 of its officers on deputation in MTNL and BSNL.
In a bid to spread its telecom footprint across the country at a time when the government has decided to unify basic and cellular licences, Tata Teleservices has applied for licences in 7 more circles, including Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.
The policy is also pushing for a one-country-one-licence regime, which means removal of roaming charges.
Private equity (PE) investments in India have fallen to a 6-year low at $24.2 billion in the financial year ending March 2024. Investments via PE deals are down 47 per cent compared to FY23, when private equity deals worth $45.8 billion were signed. According to data sourced from Bloomberg, PE firms had signed record deals worth $80 billion in the financial year ending March 2022.
Given how the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India's (Trai's) recommendations on 2G spectrum will hit telecom firms, it's not surprising that telecom stocks have plunged. Of course, the fun and games have only begun since it is up to Telecom Minister A Raja to decide whether to accept the recommendations, which ones to accept, and when to accept.
In 2011-12, India imported Rs 52,400-crore (Rs 524 billion) worth of telecom equipment; most estimates are that the figure in 2012-13 will match or even cross that number.
FLAG Telecom, the global telecom arm of the Anil Ambani-led Reliance Communications, is believed to have won a $35 million worth international deal for providing international bandwidth to China Netcom.
In 2012, ZTE India posted a small rate of growth, realising revenues of $700 million, around half the $1.5 billion it received in 2009, a write up in the state run China Daily titled 'ZTE banks Indian telecom market' said.
On receiving the award at a glittering function, Mittal said: "This is a tremendous honour and I would like to thank the GSM Association for considering me worthy of this award."
A bench comprising justices K S Radhakrishnan and Vikramajit Sen said CAG can carry out the audit to examine whether the companies are giving proper share of their revenue to the government.
