Simmonds Capital Ltd. said its wholly owned subsidiary, Midland International Corp., sold an 80 percent controlling interest in its European business to an undisclosed buyer. The transaction includes a license to distribute Midland two-way radio products in Western Europe, Africa, India, the Middle East and portions of the Far East. The sale of the Midland Europe business is part of Simmonds Capital’s plan to discontinue its two-way radio distribution business, the company said. Midland’s U.S. business was sold to Intek Diversified Corp. last year. American Digital Communications Inc. said it acquired an option to purchase all of Midland Europe. In addition, ADC granted a sub-license to Midland Europe to distribute Midland Europe land mobile radio products in Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and Southeast Asia for a three-year period. ADC, which purchased distribution rights from Midland International Corp. last year, will be entitled to receive royalties of 3.5 percent of the value of the products sold by Midland Europe.
Nokia Telecommunications signed an agreement with Helsinki City Energy Co. for a development project based on a digital Trans European Trunked Radio Access (TETRA) system. Helsinki City Energy will use the system to improve its data and speech communications, Nokia said. Beginning in April, the company will deliver switching centers, base stations, a network management system and antennas for the TETRA system. The network is expected to be operational early next year, Nokia said.
L.M. Ericsson was awarded contracts by Cellular Communications Network of Malaysia to expand and enhance its Global System for Mobile communications and Enhanced Total Access Communications System networks. Celcom’s GSM network will be expanded with 162 radio base stations, and switching capacity will be doubled in anticipation of future growth. Enhanced services including data transmission and short message service will be included as part of the network. The expansion is scheduled to be completed during the last quarter of 1997.
Motorola Inc.’s joint venture in Hangzhou, China, formally began production of Code Division Multiple Access equipment including SC 2450 CDMA base stations for the China market. Hangzhou Motorola Cellular Systems Company Ltd. is a joint venture between Motorola’s Cellular Infrastructure Group, China Posts and Telecommunications Industry Corp. and China Eastern Communications Company Ltd.
Northern Telecom Ltd. will supply Guyana Telephone & Telegraph with 2,000 fixed wireless access lines. Nortel’s Proximity family of wireless access products and DMS-10 switching equipment will provide the backbone for the network. The Proximity family uses radio technology to link businesses and residences to public switched telephone networks. The system is currently being deployed in the United Kingdom, Colombia, Finland, Sri Lanka, Scotland and the Czech Republic.
