2002

BEIJING—The Import and Export Bank of China has agreed to make a 500 million yuan (US$60 million) credit to Siemens Shanghai Mobile Communications, its first to a foreign firm.

BEIJING—The China Sports Press Association has selected CDMA handsets from Ningbo Bird to be the official mobile phones for Chinese journalists covering the 2002 World Cup finals. The company provided …

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa—Mobile network operator Econet Wireless Nigeria announced it will enter a promotion surrounding the 2002 World Cup soccer event. The company is expected to spend about US$260,000 on …

BEIJING—China Mobile (Hong Kong) will reap goodwill of around 40.3 billion yuan (US$4.87 billion) following the pending acquisition of eight provincial mobile networks from parent China Mobile Communications. China Mobile …

TOKYO—Sony announced it will launch a new storage device for mobile handsets, as well as portable music players, in July. Sony has been providing the Memory Stick storage device. The …

TORONTO—Sierra Wireless shares fell 33.8 percent on the Toronto Stock Exchange on 5 June, a day after the company cut its guidance for its second quarter and indicated sales from …

BEIJING—Huawei Technologies, based in Shenzhen, China, announced the launch of its U.S. subsidiary FutureWei, headquartered in Texas. The company will provide telecommunications and enterprise networking equipment to the U.S. and …

PARIS—France T

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa—MTN South Africa has launched its General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) service, to be available in a trial phase to its contract subscriber base prior to the commercial …

TOKYO—NTT DoCoMo said its Taiwanese partner KG Telecommunications will begin i-mode service on 20 June. The operator will launch i-mode services on its General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) network. Content …

DUBLIN, Ireland—U.K.-based Research firm Strategy Analytics has claimed that mobile operators are missing opportunities to rejuvenate their average revenue per user (ARPU) rates by not making the most of opportunities …

MELBOURNE, Australia—Vodafone Australia will move to prevent stolen mobile phones from being reconnected from the end of December. Telstra announced in April it would stop reconnections as of 15 August. …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—In an effort to promote the use of multimedia messaging service (MMS), Vizzavi Deutschland, the wireless portal jointly owned by Vodafone and Vivendi Universal, has requested Alatto Technologies …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—While the cost of integrating a camera into a cell phone is only US$10, silicon chip developer STMicroelectronics has complained that European terminal makers are resisting the move …

DUBLIN, Ireland—The pressure on dominant Irish mobile operator Vodafone Ireland has intensified with the revelation that Vodafone Group is expecting its Irish operation to improve its performance in line with …

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina—Nuevatel is planning to invest US$12.5 million this year in Bolivia to launch its long-distance service in July and expand its cellular network. The objective of both initiatives …

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina—Comsat International and Metrored this week joined the Argentine exodus that is shaking the Latin American telecommunications market. The trend began when Impsat was transferred to its creditors, …

MANILA, The Philippines—Gokongwei-owned Digital Telecommunications Philippines (Digitel) will push through with the launch of its mobile-phone operations this year. Digitel President John Gokongwei Jr. announced the move to compete in …

TOKYO—Ericsson Japan on 5 June said it would develop a roaming system for wireless local area network (WLAN) providers. In Japan, some carriers, including NTT Communications, have launched commercial-based WLAN …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—The calls for urgent changes that were recently made by Europe’s leading mobile operators about the alterations to their third-generation (3G) license conditions look likely to be rejected …

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BEIJING—Datang Telecom has cut the price of its CDMA handsets by 20 percent to 1,980 yuan (US$239.22). They are the first CDMA handsets in China priced below 2,000 yuan (US$241.63). …

Permit issues could delay operator rollouts HELSINKI, Finland-PTS, Sweden’s telecom regulatory authority, appears to have accepted the general position adopted by operators that meeting the 2002 deadline for rollout of …

ATLANTA—Air2Web announced it is developing new mobile solutions for Magnet Communications’ Internet Banking Suite to allow corporate banking customers to manage accounts and receive alerts on wireless devices. “Businesses want …

WASHINGTON—InPhonic Inc. has deployed its patent-pending, two-way short message service technology in tandem with eBay to provide a real-time alerts and interactive response service called “Wireless Rebidding” that eBay subscribers …