Qualcomm is the first international firm to announce it will participate in India’s auction for a broadband wireless access (BWA) licence. The US chip manufacturer has applied to bid for pan-India spectrum in the 2.3GHz band, and if successful, the win would accelerate the company’s deployment of the TD-LTE (Time Division Long Term Evolution) standard.

Local regulations stipulate that foreign companies can not own more than 74 per cent equity in joint ventures, and therefore Qualcomm is looking to initially partner with an existing Indian mobile operator while it builds a network based on the TD-LTE standard, a technology that offers high-speed broadband and high-end multimedia services. At a later stage, the US firm would then look to exit the joint venture.

India’s government plans to auction two slots of pan-India BWA bandwidth, with the reserve price set at INR17.5 billion (US$386 million). The broadband auction is scheduled to begin two days after the commencement of the country’s 3G auction, which starts on April 9. Local mobile operator Aircel has also stated it plans to participate in the broadband auction.

In a move which could be seen to safeguard Telecom Egypt’s revenues which dropped during 2009, Egypt’s regulator has outlawed Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) calls made through mobile Internet connections.

"The ban is on Skype on mobile internet, not on fixed, and this is due to the fact it is against the law since it bypasses the legal gateway," stated Amr Badawy, the executive president of the National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority (NTRA).

Therefore, only Telecom Egypt is prohibited to allow Skype and other such VoIP services, and not providers of mobile Internet connections: Mobinil, Etisalat Egypt and Vodafone Egypt.

"We monitor what is happening on international voice calling and it has had an adverse effect on it," Badawy added.

On March 14, Telecom Egypt posted annual revenues of EGP 9.96 billion (US$1.8 billion), a decline of less than two per cent from EGP 10.12 billion a year earlier. Despite lower revenues, net profit increased 9.7 per cent from EGP 2.79 billion in 2008 to EGP 3.06 billion in 2009.

The ban follows the United Arab Emirates’ regulator which announced on March 15 that international companies such as Skype would not receive VoIP licences to operate in the UAE. Only local firms Etisalat, Du, Thuraya and YahSat are licenced to provided VoIP services.

Orascom Telecom Holding (OTH) posted a net loss of US$46.4 million during the quarter ending December 31, 2009, largely impacted by recent unfavourable events in Algeria. The group reported a net profit of US$318 million for the full year, 26 per cent lower than 2008. Annual revenues declined by 4.9 per cent to US$5.06 billion.

Executive chairman Naguib Sawiris said the company would reconsider its investment in Algeria, if it becomes clear its investment is not wanted there

The operator ended the year with 92.85 million subscribers, a growth of 19 per cent over the previous year’s figure of 78 million. This is broken down by subsidiary as follows: Mobilink Pakistan 30.8 million; Mobinil Egypt 25.4 million; Djezzy Algeria 14.6 million; Banglalink 13.9 million; Tunisiana 5.2 million; Telecel Globe (Burundi, Central African Republic, Namibia, Zimbabwe) 1.8 million; Alfa Lebanon one million; and Koryolink North Korea 91,700.

ARPUs declined by 13.4 per cent in 2009 from US$6.60 to US$5.70.

The recent riot events in Algeria following the football match between Algeria and Egypt incurred significant losses for the firm. OTH estimates the impact of the riots on fourth quarter 2009 EBITDA to be around US$55 million, made up of loss of revenue opportunity, damages to stock (SIM and scratch cards, handsets) and provision for taxes.

In addition, the company is still involved in a dispute with the Algerian government over a backdated US$600 million tax bill for the fiscal years 2004 to 2007. On March 7, Algerian tax authorities rejected an appeal from OTH filed in December for a tax reassessment. OTH intends to file an appeal before the Central Commission, which under Algerian law requires payment of 20 per cent of the balance of taxes and penalties alleged to be owing, equating to around US$110 million.

Executive chairman of OTH Naguib Sawiris commented, “We are keen to stay in Algeria; it is one of our main assets and until this incident we were very happy there. However, we need to understand if our investment is welcome there or not. If not, we will consider other options. As always, we consider our strategic position in each country in which we operate to maximise shareholder value.”

The UAE’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) today announced that it has revised the Voice over IP (“VoIP”) Regulatory Policy, allowing licensees (Etisalat and Du) to offer a greater range of VoIP services.

The revised policy also exempts certain usages from its provisions, for example, for UAE academic and governmental institutions.

The latest revisions allow the widening use of VoIP in the UAE, but still tie them to the country’s two licensed operators. The provision of third-party VoIP services remains illegal. The TRA made it clear that as is the case with other telecom services in the UAE, parties other than the licensees may not provide VoIP services.

Etisalat and Du may provide VoIP services as:

(1) An end-to-end voice service (as in the traditional telephony);  

(2) As a “feature” on top of connectivity service; or

(3) In any other form that the licensee may wish to provide

India’s Reliance Communications (RCom) said it has reached the milestone of 100 million mobile customers in India, making it the second operator after Bharti Airtel to do so. Subscribers were added through both its GSM and CDMA operations and the company now aims to sign up the next 100 million customers within the following 1,000 days.

"The landmark 100 million mobile customer base makes us the youngest telecom operator to achieve this milestone in such a short span of time,” stated Anil Ambani, chairman of Reliance ADA Group, referring to accomplishing this feat within seven years of launching its first nationwide mobile service in 2003.

“Reliance Communications pioneered the mobile revolution in India and since then we have been the frontrunner of telecom innovations in the country. As we take the leap to achieve the 200 million mark, we will lead it from the front with a more customer-centric innovations and service approach."

RCom plans to rollout a CDMA mobile broadband network with Internet speeds of up to 3.1Mbps across more than 60 cities, within the next 100 days. This brings the total number of cities covered by its mobile broadband service to 125.