ITALY
Business customers of Omnitel Pronto Italia now can call from Italy to Europe, the United States and Canada for the same price as local calls, announced Omnitel. “Italian telecommunications is evolving into a hyper-market, with multiple global players and a strong `customer pull’ for the convergence of wired and wireless services,” said Tom Bartlett, president and chief executive officer of Bell Atlantic International Wireless. The company said the new international rates are the lowest in Italy’s cellular market and are competitive with landline rates.
THE NETHERLANDS
Coherent Communications Systems, an echo cancellation and voice enhancement company, said it has supplied further consignments of its EC-6000 and EC-7000 Series 2 echo cancelers to PTT Telecom Netherlands. Coherent values its total contract at slightly less than $1 million. The echo cancelers are used in PTT Telecom’s international switching and Global System for Mobile communications operations. PTT Telecom originally installed Coherent’s EC-7000 Series 2 digital echo cancelers, together with all ancillary cabling equipment. Coherent provided a full turnkey installation, with the system going live in 1996.
GUATEMALA
Guatemala City will be the first city to benefit from a planned $72 million expansion of the Telecommunicaciones de Guatemala network, Northern Telecom Inc. announced. Providing its 1900 MHz Code Division Multiple Access wireless infrastructure, Nortel expects to begin construction in Guatemala’s capital city during the first quarter. Subsequent phases will add coverage for 150,000 subscribers in regions throughout Guatemala, including Puerto Barrios, Quetzaltenango, Escuintla and Puerto Quetzal.
NORWAY
Omnipoint Communications Inc. announced its 36th operational roaming agreement, with wireless carrier Telenor Mobil of Norway. It is Omnipoint’s first roaming agreement in the country where one in three people use a wireless phone, the majority of which are Global System for Mobile communications subscribers, said Omnipoint.
