Cellular-News: Thursday 1st June 2006

Cellular-News -

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[[ 3G ]]

Anatel: Public consultation for 3G licenses before Sep

Brazil's telecoms regulator Anatel expects to hold a public consultation before September to evaluate interest in applying for 3G licenses, TI Inside reported Anatel director Jarbas Valente as saying. ...

Qualcomm Opens African 3G Center

Qualcomm has opened its African hub, based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Qualcomm's new office will also serve as a base for implementing Wireless Reach projects, which seek to empower underserved communities through the use of 3G wireless technolog...

Mobile Operators' 3G CAPEX Rising Sharply

Two years ago, announcements of capital spending on 3G deployments were mainly made by the largest operators in the most developed nations, but today many smaller and incumbent operators in developing and less saturated markets are also increasing CA...

[[ Financial ]]

Russia's NSS mobile operator 2005 RAS net profit up 34% on yr

The net profit of Russian regional mobile operator Nizhegorodskaya Sotovaya Svyaz (NSS) increased 34% on the year to 444.727 million rubles in 2005, as calculated under Russian Accounting Standards (RAS), the company said Wednesday. ...

Altimo disputes Telenor's reporting of Kyivstar results

Altimo, the telecommunications arm of Russian holding Alfa Group, disputed Wednesday financial reporting practices of Norwegian telecommunication company Telenor. ...

Celtel Buys Nigerian Operator

Celtel, a subsidiary of MTC Group has announced that it has reached agreement to acquire a controlling stake of 65% in Vmobile, one of Nigeria's leading mobile telecom operators, for US$1.005 billion. This agreement marks the company's largest ever a...

[[ Handsets ]]

Changing Fonts on Cellphones

Monotype Imaging says that it is introducing a suite of scalable fonts for mobile phones -- the first in the industry to offer handset manufacturers, wireless operators, content providers and publishers the ability to integrate into their products rea...

Top ten Mobile Phone Sales in Telia Stores

Sony Ericsson and Nokia captured the leading positions on Telia's top-ten list of best-selling mobile phones in Telia's retail stores during May. The list has changed only slightly since April. Sony Ericsson had the only new mobile handset for the mo...

Mobile Phone Sales in Q1 Indicate a Strong 2006

Worldwide mobile phone sales totaled 224 million units in the first quarter of 2006, a 23.8% increase from the same period last year, according to Gartner. These strong results for the quarter have resulted in Gartner increasing its mobile phone sale...

[[ Legal ]]

IN BRIEF: Salinas/SEC close to settlement over fraud charges

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Mexican media mogul Ricardo Salinas could be close to reaching a settlement on fraud charges arising from a 2003 debt transaction, Mexican daily El Norte quoted SEC lawyer Harold Loftin as saying. ...

Ringback Tone Patent Awarded

Nearly two years after the actual introduction of ringback tones by wireless carriers, the U.S. Patent Office has granted official patent status to patent filer Karl Seelig, CEO of Perceptive Impression, for ring back signal replacement. This final s...

[[ Network Contracts ]]

Ericsson Wins Serbian GSM Contract

Ericsson has signed a US$96 million contract with the Serbian operator, Telekom Serbia for the provision of equipment and services for the expansion and upgrade of Telekom Serbia's GSM/GPRS/EDGE network. This agreement is the largest Ericsson contrac...

Easy Handset Settings for Swedish Operator

Telenor Sweden has gone live with a Mobile Device Management (MDM) solution from SmartTrust that will allow it to better manage subscriber access to data services such as MMS, Email, WAP and Push-to-Talk (PTT). Using SmartTrust's MDM solution SmartMa...

[[ Network Operators ]]

France Telecom Rebrands Services Orange In Overhaul

France Telecom, which has seen its stock fall 32% under current management, Wednesday said it is now selling Internet, TV and mobile phone services under the Orange brand as part of a larger overhaul. ...

Digicel to invest US$5mn in network upgrades in Dominica

Caribbean mobile operator Digicel has earmarked US$5mn for its operations in the eastern Caribbean island of Dominica, the company said in a statement. ...

AMX registers Claro brand

Mexico's America Movil has registered in Chile its Claro brand for all types of telecommunication services, from mobile telephony to any equipment related to the sector, according to information published in Chile's official gazette. ...

[[ Personnel ]]

TeliaSonera: Prosecutor Charges CEO Igel With Bribery

Swedish telecommunications operator TeliaSonera's chairman, Tom von Weymarn, said he remains confident in Chief Executive Anders Igel despite bribery charges being brought against him. ...

[[ Regulatory ]]

Italy's Regulator Opens Probe Into Fixed-Mobile Services

The Italian communication authority said Wednesday it opened a preliminary probe into the so-called integrated fixed-mobile telecommunication services. ...

[[ Reports ]]

GSA Announces HSDPA Network Deployments Reach 100

The latest "HSDPA Operator Commitments" survey undertaken by vendor trade association GSA - Global mobile Suppliers Association, confirms that 100 HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access) networks, an increase of 100% in 6 months, are in deployment ...

Global Mobile Gambling Market to Reach $23bn by 2011

The popularity of Mobile gambling, involving casinos, lotteries and betting, is set to rise from under US$2 billion (in terms of bets placed) to in excess of US$23 billion come 2011, according to industry analysts Juniper Research. The increasing tre...