2002

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina—Since early April, 1 million Telef

BEIJING—The Hong Kong-listed arm of China Unicom posted first-quarter revenue of 8.35 billion yuan (US$1 billion), while China Mobile reported 23.35 billion yuan (US$2.82 billion). Revenue from China Unicom’s mobile …

BEIJING—China’s largest domestic mobile handset maker China Putian is planning an overseas listing. The company sold 28.96 million handsets last year. China Putian is about to appoint Lehman Brothers and …

BEIJING—Hong Kong’s CSL and Hutchison Telecom started offering services that enable corporate customers to use mobile phones and personal digital assistants (PDAs) to access intranets, e-mail and contacts. Users can …

BEIJING—China Unicom has purchased mobile-Internet technology from Openwave Systems to make its CDMA services more attractive. The company is counting on data services to lure high-end customers to its CDMA …

BEIJING—Despite an official ban, China Mobile’s subsidiary in southwestern Guizhou Province launched a trial run of a controversial calling-party-pays billing system. China is officially still using a two-way billing system, …

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina—The Smartcom PCS objective is to overtake Chile’s third-largest operator, BellSouth, this year in subscriber numbers and move from its last-place position to third place. To achieve the …

BEIJING—Reports of China’s Ministry of Information Industry (MII) indicate that China Mobile’s revenue and market share account for 79.8 percent and 70.4 percent respectively of total Chinese mobile telecom revenues …

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa—South Africa’s third mobile network operator Cell C has announced that the company has nearly doubled the number of subscribers it originally forecast for the first five months …

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OXFORD, United Kingdom—The boom in European short message service (SMS) traffic is forecast to peak in 2003 as other messaging technology bites into the service from 2004 onward, claims new …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—The Polish telecom regulator, URTiP, has conceded that the three operators that purchased third-generation (3G) licenses will not be held to the contractual launch date due to the …

OXFORD, United Kingdom—A new report from the Finnish radiation authority has said cellular base stations are safe, as long as they are properly installed. The government-funded watchdog, S

STOCKHOLM, Sweden—Ericsson has dismissed market speculation in Sweden that its latest swing of the downsizing ax is driven by a need to attract a takeover suitor. Nokia is being linked …

WASHINGTON—A new report claims the costs of arbitration—billed as a low-cost alternative to lawsuits and required in service contracts for mobile phones and other electronic contracts—are so expensive that consumers …

ALEXANDRA, Va.—Metrocall Inc. announced it is working on a pre-negotiated plan for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and is pushing back the date it plans to file for reorganization. The company said …

HELSINKI, Finland—Nokia Corp. said it has signed a $50 million deal to supply GSM infrastructure equipment to Thailand operator Advanced Info Service Plc.“Under the agreement, Nokia will supply to AIS …

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.—Alltel Corp. priced an offering of $1.25 billion in publicly traded equity units at $50 with a yield of 7.75 percent and a conversion premium of 22 percent, …

MUNICH, Germany—Infineon Technologies has set up a new local area wireless technology unit, signaling its plan to increase its research and development on Bluetooth and wireless LAN. “In order to …

TOKYO—Cybird, a leading mobile content provider, announced that it tied up with China.com for content distribution services in China. Upon the contract, Moeasy, a subsidiary of China.com, will distribute fortune-telling …

MANILA, The Philippines—Due to the solid performance of its mobile-phone subsidiary Smart Communications, Philippine Long Distance Telephone (PLDT) net earnings last year more than tripled to 3.4 billion Philippine pesos …

NEW DELHI, India—Bangladesh has reduced the import duty on mobile phones and dropped the levy on new connections. The duty on handsets has been reduced to 2,500 taka (US$44) from …

TOKYO—Kyocera, the world’s largest maker of integrated circuit (IC) ceramic packages and a leading mobile handset vendor in Japan, has won a large-scale wireless local loop (WLL) order from a …

JAKARTA, Indonesia—General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) technology will not bring killer data applications, at least during this year in Indonesia, according to industry executives. Rudiantara, head of the country’s cellular …

TOKYO—East Japan Railway, the leading railroad operator in Japan, on 1 May said it would launch a new service letting mobile users use their phones as train tickets beginning in …