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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Moderated Thread - please read rules before posting -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: John Biddle who wrote (30816)	1/7/2003 7:12:21 AM
From: John Biddle	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 197271

Basic, GSM Operators Finally Return To Interconnectivity Mode Our Corporate Bureau financialexpress.com Hyderabad, January 6: The ongoing interconnectivity problem between the basic operators and GSM operators has been amicably settled with the restoration of the interconnectivity on Monday. "It is not a fight between Tata Teleservices and Bharti. It is a wake-up call for the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) to understand the problem and react immediately," said Mr Sunil Mittal, chairman and managing director, Bharti Enterprises. "We have approached the Trai every month for the last one year on this issue and the Trai has not reacted which led to the decision on terminating interconnectivity, he said. However, we hope that Trai is expected to take a decision by the end of this month," Mr Mittal said at a press conference here on Monday on the sidelines of CII Partnership Summit. The company has restored the interconnectivity service, he added. The cellular operators want to have a level-playing field as against the CDMA operators as GSM calls for huge investment for technological upgradation and high operational expenditures. "We hope that all the problems between CDMA and GSM operators would be solved by the end of March this year," Mr Mittal said further. The Supreme Court judgement is to refer the pricing issue once again to TDSAT is a welcome move and the cellular industry expect that TDSAT would give a favourable verdict on increasing the tariffs which would provide a level-playing field, he said. "We see there is an exiting future for the GSM technology in India. Though CDMA technology has been doing successfully, but however there are only few countries which adopt this technology. This year too GSM service providers would see a treble-digit growth like last year," Mr Mittal said confidently. "With more number of players getting into the telecom coupled with the lower tariff rates, I see there is going to be consolidation in the telecom sector in India. Acquisitions and mergers would take place as only strong players will remain in the fray," Mr Mittal claimed. The government should draw policies to allow mergers and acquisitions in telecom sector so that the unviable players can get rid of the sector, he added.