Mobile operator strategies - 03/11/05

Vodafone is using vending machines to sell mobile phones in the UK,

EMT has launched their commercial 3G network in Estonia,

A 3G TDD network has been launched in Lithuania, under the brand name, "Neltes tinklas".

Vimpelcom (Russia) may buy Ukraine' s URS mobile operator,

SingTel (Singapore) wants to raise its 30.8% stake in Bharti Televentures (India), The interest in Bharti rose as Vodafone bought 10% in Bharti last week.

VIVO (Brazil) has expanded its 3G CDMA2000 1X and 1xEV-DO broadband network in the North, South, and Center-West regions of Brazil using solutions from Nortel,

Telenor bought Vodafone Sweden for $1,25bn.

Dysney could plan French and UK MVNO operations next year,

Seven subsidiaries of Russia's second-largest mobile operator VimpelCom have approved merging into their parent company,

MTS (Russia) has bought the remaining 49% stake in Turkmenistan mobile operator Barash Communications Technologies Inc. (BCTI) for $18.5m,

Hutchison Telecommunications is in talks to sell its majority stake in Israel's Partner Comm, for about $750m,

Cingular is offering a BlackBerry device engineered to run on an EDGE network.