Mobile Telecommunications Company (Zain), the third largest telecom operator in West Asia and a leading operator in Africa, has initiated talks with several Indian telecom service providers to buy stakes.
Etisalat, which is mulling an Indian foray, has since started discussions with several telecom companies including the Videocon Group's Datacom Solutions and Essar-controlled Loop Telecom for equity. Ravi Sharma, CEO of Datacom confirmed that Etilasat was one of the companies to which the company was talking but declined to offer details. Loop Telecom declined to comment.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday issued show causes notices for alleged foreign exchange violations of Rs 3,805 crore (Rs 38.05 billion) to telecom firms and other entities as part of its investigation into the 2G spectrum allocation case.
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India on Monday slashed termination charges by 33 per cent.
The government on Tuesday started allocating GSM spectrum to new telecom players, commencing with the Tamil Nadu circle including Chennai, in a move that would infuse more competition in the mobile telephony space.Five new players -- Videocon-promoted Datacom, Idea Cellular, realty major Unitech, Swan Telecom and Loop Telecom -- have been given start-up 4.4 MHz GSM spectrum in Tamil Nadu circle.
The mobile tariffs in the world's cheapest telecom market are set to fall further by at least 20-25 per cent during the year, more so due to increasing number of telecom operators and infrastructure overcapacity.
Over a year after the judgement was reserved, a bench of justices G S Singhvi and S J Mukhopadhaya rejected the pleas of the telecom companies which pleaded that they be tried in a magisterial court unlike other accused in 2G cases as they have not been charged under Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act.
The Delhi high court on Tuesday allowed the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate's pleas seeking an early hearing into the appeals challenging the acquittal of former telecom minister A Raja and others in the 2G spectrum allocation case.
A special court on Thursday acquitted all accused in the 2G spectrum allocation scam cases. The scam relates to the granting of 2G spectrum licence allocations in 2007-08 which caused, according to a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India, a loss of Rs 1.76 lakh crore. Here is a detailed timeline of how the case came to light and how it has progressed over the years:
The company has launched a new card, the India One Pre-paid, under which users can make STD calls at a flat rate of Re 1 per minute. SMSes to any destination in the country would also be charged at a flat rate of Re 1 per message, BPL Mobile director and CEO S Subramaniam told Business Standard in an interview.
Lenders, with Rs 600-cr exposure to telco, want it to sell properties to repay loans.
The court said a 'scam was created when there was none'.
The Supreme Court in February, 2012 had quashed 122 2G licences.
To bring clarity, the department clearly defines terms such as promoter and competitor.
The telephone subscriber base was 996.49 million at the end of March.
Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, on October 15, gave its recommendation on spectrum auction for premium 900 Mhz band and 1800 Mhz band that are presently being used for 2G GSM mobile services by Airtel, Vodafone, Idea Cellular and Reliance Communications.
The recent Indian telecom spectrum auction will hasten industry consolidation, strengthen tariffs and reduce regulatory risks.
He allegedly advanced the cut-off date to favour accused firms in allocation of 2G licences.
The fear of another scam pushed the government into a rather long period of so-called 'policy paralysis'. To play it safe, the price of spectrum in all subsequent auctions was benchmarked to the high 3G rates, says Surajeet Das Gupta.
DoT decides not to scrap dual-technology telecom licences
Agreement between Bharti Airtel and Loop Mobile, which offers mobile services in Mumbai, expired on October 31