Myanmar mobile phone licenses still not issued
Telenor and Ooredoo, the two companies that won the bid for Myanmar’s much-anticipated foreign-offered mobile telecommunications services, haven’t yet been issued their formal licenses although the bidding round dates almost half a year back, The Irrawaddy reported.
The licenses are unlikely to be available before August 2014, as negotiations continue over finalising network operator frameworks and related telecoms rules.
“We are in discussions with the government about the draft license and we expect that to complete by the end of 013,” Telenor Myanmar CEO Petter Furberg said during a press conference in Rangoon on November 19.
After the license will be awarded, Telenor says it will launch its mobile network within eight months, beating the deadline set out by the Myanmar government, which also stipulates that awardees have five years to offer voice services across 75 per cent of the country and data services, such as mobile internet, across half of the country.
In June 2013, the Myanmar government announced that Norway’s Telenor and Qatar’s Ooredoo won a hotly-contested tender for two 15 year telecommunications licenses. Ooredoo has said it will issue SIM cards just six months after the start date of the forthcoming licenses.
The formal license awarding was originally expected by September 2013, but was subsequently held up by parliamentary debate over Myanmar’s new telecommunications law. And though the measure has since been passed, ongoing negotiations over the related telecoms rules, which were posted on the Ministry of Communications and Technology website on November 4 and are open for public comment until December 2, have also slowed up the license awarding process.
Ooredoo and Telenor will not be the only two foreign companies offering network services in Myanmar, as the government is soliciting partnership applications from some of the losing bidders in the initial license race.
Telenor and Ooredoo, the two companies that won the bid for Myanmar's much-anticipated foreign-offered mobile telecommunications services, haven't yet been issued their formal licenses although the bidding round dates almost half a year back, The Irrawaddy reported. The licenses are unlikely to be available before August 2014, as negotiations continue over finalising network operator frameworks and related telecoms rules. “We are in discussions with the government about the draft license and we expect that to complete by the end of 013,” Telenor Myanmar CEO Petter Furberg said during a press conference in Rangoon on November 19. After the license will...
Telenor and Ooredoo, the two companies that won the bid for Myanmar’s much-anticipated foreign-offered mobile telecommunications services, haven’t yet been issued their formal licenses although the bidding round dates almost half a year back, The Irrawaddy reported.
The licenses are unlikely to be available before August 2014, as negotiations continue over finalising network operator frameworks and related telecoms rules.
“We are in discussions with the government about the draft license and we expect that to complete by the end of 013,” Telenor Myanmar CEO Petter Furberg said during a press conference in Rangoon on November 19.
After the license will be awarded, Telenor says it will launch its mobile network within eight months, beating the deadline set out by the Myanmar government, which also stipulates that awardees have five years to offer voice services across 75 per cent of the country and data services, such as mobile internet, across half of the country.
In June 2013, the Myanmar government announced that Norway’s Telenor and Qatar’s Ooredoo won a hotly-contested tender for two 15 year telecommunications licenses. Ooredoo has said it will issue SIM cards just six months after the start date of the forthcoming licenses.
The formal license awarding was originally expected by September 2013, but was subsequently held up by parliamentary debate over Myanmar’s new telecommunications law. And though the measure has since been passed, ongoing negotiations over the related telecoms rules, which were posted on the Ministry of Communications and Technology website on November 4 and are open for public comment until December 2, have also slowed up the license awarding process.
Ooredoo and Telenor will not be the only two foreign companies offering network services in Myanmar, as the government is soliciting partnership applications from some of the losing bidders in the initial license race.
