Instant Messaging Service Nimbuzz Acquired by UK’s New Call Telecom for $ 175 million

India-based Nimbuzz has sold 70% stake to UK-based New Call Telecom for about $175 million putting Nimbuzz value at $250 million as the UK firm plans more acquisitions in the Indian e-commerce, fixed line broadband and Wi-Fi market.

With over 201 million subscribers might be another WhatsApp or Viber acquired for $19 billion and $900 million by Facebook Japanese’ Rakuten respectively.

According to people close to Nimbuzz, the firm processes a billion plus Skype-like calls  and over 100 billion instant messages and also has a huge mobile ad platform serving clients in the MENA region and South Asia. The free messaging,voice and video calling app combines the powers of the Internet and mobile communications into one, and lets users call, text, meet, share and connect with family and friends on any mobile device.

UK’s New Call Telecom on Tuesday announced plans to invest as much as $100 million in acquisitions in India in the next 18 months to grow its presence in India.

Dr. Jerome Booth, Chairman, New Call Telecom and Founder, New Sparta Pvt. Ltd., stated, “The Indian National Telecom Policy 2012 has targeted 100 per cent tele-density and 600 million broadband connections by 2020. We are looking at strategic acquisitions to enable New Call Telecom to make strong organic growth in the fast growing Indian telecom market and establish a pan-India presence. We’ve initially allocated US $ 100 million for the purpose and are optimistic of further growth due to the depth of entrepreneurial talent in the telecom services space in India.”
The firms’ short term vision in India is to capture the massive opportunity that the telecom sector presents surrounding data transit, usage manipulation, and streaming; where ever possible collaborating with other incumbent telecom operators efforts.

With over a billion people, India is a ripe market for New Call Telecom. The acquisition of Nimbuzz gives it faster inroads into the market and saves it the customer acquisition woes.

Source: http://techmoran.com/

Ahead of its 4G Launch, Reliance Jio Plans merging with 2 of its subsidiaries

With an aim of bringing all its telecom related operations under a single entity before the launch of its 4G services next year, Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited is merging its two subsidiaries with itself.
Infotel Telecom Limited, one of the two merging subsidiaries is the one that owns the long-distance telephony licenses while the other, Rancore Technologies acts as the R&D Unit. Reliance Jio currently holds the unified license for 4G services in India. The merger with Infotel a Telecom will allow Reliance Jio to conduct national as well as international long-distance business with a single license.

Pending Approvals

Already registered with the Registrar of Companies, Infotel Telecom had previously received the company court's approval for the merger. Now, it is seeking an approval for amalgamation from the Department of Telecommunications. Close sources disclose that the department is yet to issue a formal written consent.

Even though the approval is pending, the merger between the two companies is considered effective September 1, 2014. Reliance Jio is yet to submit details with regards to the minimum paid-up capital of the company along with the minimum net-worth details of both companies to the Department of Telecommunications.

Sources say that the department has requested some details including certificates that highlight the Indian and foreign equity held by Infotel Telecom along with the details of minimum paid-up capital. The department has recommended that the Telecom Ministry's wireless planning & coordination wing also take a look at the proposal. This is because Reliance Jio holds 20 MHz of broadband and wireless access spectrum across 22 circles within India.

Reliance Jio has sought similar approvals for the merger of Rancore Technologies with itself.

What to Expect with the Launch of Reliance Jio's Services

The company currently holds 1800 MHz spectrum across 14 circles and 2300 MHz in 22circles. With the much awaited launch of 4G wireless services in 2015, it is expected that a number of customer woes will come to an end.

For instance, after having crossed a major technical hurdle during its testing phase that began a few weeks ago, it is expected that customers will soon be able to enjoy same data speeds even when they move from one state to another while roaming on the 4G network.

A senior Reliance Jio executive belonging to the network team explained, "When a customer is roaming, the critical issue is continuous connectivity. Operators have struggled, when the subscriber moves from one circle to another with problems such as call drops, low connectivity or even no connectivity. With our vast network agreements, it has become possible and tests have shown 99.95% success."

Reliance Jio has also signed infrastructure sharing agreements with companies like RCom and Bharti to share infrastructure, and tower sharing deals firms such as GTL Infra, Indus Towers and Ascend Telecom. The aim is to keep cost down during various stages of service deployment. The company aims to lease out about 70,000 towers and install about 30,000 of their own. This includes smaller cell sites on individual poles.

Source: Meri News

GSM mobile operators add 61.2 lakh users in September: COAI

The GSM subscriber base in the country rose marginally to 75.60 crore in September with mobile operators adding 61.2 lakh users during the month, industry body COAI said on Thursday.

The GSM user base stood at 74.99 crore at the end of August 2014, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI) said.

COAI, which represents telecom players like Bharti Airtel, Vodafone and Idea Cellular, said the data does not include GSM subscriber number of Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices.

Reliance Jio Infocomm had also joined the body but the company is yet to start telecom services.

“All India GSM cellular subscriber figures as of September 2014 stood at 756.08 million. The GSM subscribers increase by 6.12 million in September 2014 (0.82 per cent increase from previous month),” COAI said.

Idea Cellular added the maximum number of users in September with 17.2 lakh subscribers joining its network. The total base of the company stood at 14.35 crore with a market share of 18.99 per cent at the end of the month.

Vodafone added 13.5 lakh users to take its base to 17.38 crore and market share to 22.99 per cent at the end of September.

Bharti Airtel added 10.22 lakh users in the month to take its subscriber base to 21.15 crore in the reported period. It has a market share of 27.98 per cent at the end of September.

Aircel added 9.56 lakh users in the reported period and its user base stood at 7.58 crore at the end of the month whereas Uninor added 9.41 lakh users to take its base to 4.18 crore.

Videocon added 1.07 lakh subscribers to take its base to 59.41 lakh and state-run MTNL added 14,223 users to take its base to 33.08 lakh at the end of September.

Source: HBL

MediaTek says India its largest market on mobile after China

MediaTek, the Taiwanese chipset maker, expects to ship about 350 million smartphone chipsets to vendors worldwide in 2014, with India one of the top five markets, a top executive said, adding that the company expects affordable 4G smartphones to be launched in the South Asian nation later next year.

"Very clearly, India is the largest market for MediaTek on mobile, outside of China," said Finbarr Moynihan, general manager for international corporate sales at the chipset maker, which has a 30% share globally and shipped 220 million smartphones chipsets till December 2013.

MediaTek ranks India as its largest market for 3G growth in smartphones and 2G feature phones. As the 4G ecosystem develops in India, the company expects affordable, dual-band LTE smartphones in the second half next year, by when Reliance Jio Infocomm is expected to have launched its high-speed wireless Internet services.

"We will certainly see entry-level LTE smartphones at affordable price points with reduced feature sets, display, camera quality, less memory, the usual by the second half of next year," Moynihan said.

LTE, or long-term evolution, is a technology that allows telecom companies to provide higher Internet speeds to consumers on their mobile phones. MediaTek, which competes with Qualcomm globally, on Monday launched its 4G LTE chipset compatible with both TDD and FDD modes, using 2300 MHz and 1800 MHz, respectively.

The company expects some manufacturers to launch devices using its new 4G LTE octa-core, multi-mode chipset by December, though on the premium end.

Moynihan added that India will benefit a lot from China, where the band and frequency structures are almost similar and sales of 4G LTE phones are only rising. This can drive economies of scale for India as carriers and handset makers move towards offering 4G smartphones in the mid- and low-price brackets, making the two countries the biggest markets for LTE growth for chipset makers, including Qualcomm and Intel.

"In terms of criticality, India will be the largest 3G market for us over the next two years as China progresses towards LTE," Moynihan said.

At present, Bharti Airtel and Aircel offer 4G services in select areas. Reliance Jio Infocomm, which has 4G airwaves countrywide, is widely speculated to launch low-priced yet high-speed data services on mobile phones that support LTE.

"We are in discussions with them. They will likely be the major drivers for LTE in India," Moynihan said when asked about partnering with Reliance Jio. "When they become mainstream, we hope to be a big part of their portfolio going forward," he added.

MediaTek will work with Reliance Jio to pre-certify its chipsets and modem solutions to meet network or frequency requirements, a practice the company follows with global carriers, more so in markets driven by them. This allows handset makers to create smartphones that will work on the service providers' frequencies and bands, including compatibility on both TDD and FDD LTE.

"We hope we can accomplish the appropriate testing, validation and certifications with Reliance and other carriers in India over the next couple of months or quarters. They (RJio) have some special requirements," he added, without elaborating.

Source: ET

Reliance Jio seeks powerful airwaves in 6 and 7 GHz band

Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd (RJio), the telecom arm of Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), is seeking Microwave Backbone (MWB) frequency — airwaves used to connect towers — carriers in 6 and 7 GHz band on a “priority” basis.

“We require at least two MWB frequency carriers of 28 MHz paired bandwidth each in the 22 service areas in the 6 and 7 GHz spectrum band for point-to-point microwave backhaul links,” the company said in a request to the Department of Telecom.

The non-availability of MWB frequency carriers is severely hampering the rollout of its network, the letter, a copy of which was seen by BusinessLine, said.

Microwaves are electromagnetic waves with wavelengths with frequencies between 300 MHz (0.3 GHz) and 300 GHz.

The company, controlled by billionaire Mukesh Ambani, was allocated “only a few” MWA frequency carriers in 13 and 18 GHz band, which is not suitable for rollout in rural areas.

“These being high frequency bands, the hop lengths are typically short due to the high atmosphere loss as well as high attenuation in rains. Therefore, their usage is limited to intra metro routes or for short distance backhauls only,” the company said.

The MWB carriers in 6 and 7 GHz band are less susceptible to atmospheric vagaries and providing better up time. This will enable provision of good quality services to customers in the rural areas, it said. The rollout clauses of the Government also mention that the company is required to provide coverage across 50 per cent of the rural areas in a time-bound manner.

Backhaul spectrum

Earlier, industry body Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) had sought for release for backhaul spectrum. Prior to which Telecom Regulatory Authority of India rolled out recommendations on the same, while the DoT on its part has constituted a committee to look into this.

RJio holds pan-India unified licence and spectrum in 1800 MHz (across 14 circles) and 2300 MHz (across 22 circles) and is gearing up to launch fourth generation wireless services in 2015.

Source: Hindu Business Line

Reliance to shortly launch 4G services

Indore : Reliance Industries Limited’s sister concern Reliance Jio will shortly debut its revolutionary Internet service 4G via free services to over 1,000 schools in underprivileged villages of MP. The installation of equipment and laying of cable lines for the fourth generation ( 4G) Internet service in 40 cities of the state is nearly complete and services will be rolled out shortly.

Reliance Industries Limited’s state head of corporate affairs Sanjiv Arora pointed out they are planning to roll out their service with a charity objective.

As part of the plan, they are preparing a proposal to offer free 4G connection to 1,000 schools in underprivileged villages so that the students of such schools can also be part of the digital revolution.

Arora said that were preparing a proposal and would hand it over to the state government for their permission. The task of identifying such schools is also underway currently.

On the other hand, additional chief secretary SR Mohanti said that he was aware that Reliance was going to present such a proposal to the government during GIS, but it did not happen.

RIL chief Mukesh Ambani had visited the local company office after attending the inaugural session of the GIS. He had reviewed the preparation for rolling out 4G service in the state and had appreciated the efforts of the team for undertaking the job in a record time.

Source: http://freepressjournal.in/

MediaTek launches the MT6595, a true octa core SoC that supports 4G LTE

The Taiwanese semiconductor company MediaTek has been pitching itself rather aggressively in the market emerging as the best affordable chipsets for mobile solutions. MediaTek announced the MT6595 which will be the worlds first True Octa-Core 4G LTE SoC. MediaTeks new offering will be available to the Indian consumers commercially as we reach the end of this year. This premium chipset is expected to propel the chip maker to an entirely new level and also help in bringing the 4G technologies to lower end devices.

MediaTek has already got a quantum leap in terms after joining hands with Google to supply the hardware for the ultra affordable Android One devices. It has once again reached out to manufacturers and industry leaders so that these chips will unlock new industrial potential.

Dr.Finbarr General Manager sales of MediaTek said that ”MediaTek is focused on delivering a full range of 4G LTE platforms, and the MT 6595 is the first of many to arrive in India. Our 4G LTE solutions support all modes including TDD LTE, which is important for India because infrastructure providers in the country are currently focusing on the TDD LTE network”.

MediaTek has started a new facility in Bengaluru which will sync up with the one in Noida to boost the R&D capabilities. The 4G LTE is the next big thing in the Indian telecom scene with the Reliance Jio gearing up for the same.

Source: Telecom Talk