Telcoflash: Telecom Market News

Orascom (Egypt)) reports 9-month net profit of $500m (+75%), while revenues rose 63% to $2,5bn. Rostelecom (Russia) announced 1H net profit of $98m (+17%).

GSM dominance About 80% of mobile subscribers (or 1.6bn people) are using GSM-based services. In 12 months, GSM added 381m new customers, more than the entire customer base of any other mobile digital technology. More than 670 mobile service providers...

UN bless ICANN' s Internet management In World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) pre-meetings, negotiators finally agreed on a compromise: ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) will continue to run the Internet network and...

Cisco announced a deal to buy Scientific Atlanta for about $7bn. What is the strategy behind this deal, one of the largest acquisitions ever for Cisco? Video, Video and Video. First Cisco acknowledged it was not enough aggressive in the IPTV market and...

Microsoft' strategy Microsoft is trying to turn every PC into a potential TV. The idea was in the air, but Microsoft teamed with Cable Television Laboratories (CableLabs), to connect PCs directly to cable feed, bypassing the cable modem and the IP infrastructure....

IBM, Sony, Philips, Red Hat and Novell have formed Open Invention Network (OIN), an organization to share Linux patents without royalties. The move is aimed to solve ownership rights problems encountered by distributors (represented by Red Hat and Novell)...

Consumers want more mobile in service packages According to In-Stat, telcos are not providing mobile in their service packages as frequently as customers would like. Only 18% of current bundle subscribers have mobility, even if 32% want to include mobility...

The VoWLAN marketplace is warming Pyramid Research expects Europe to take the lead in VoWLAN implementation, because wireline competitive operators need to offer new services, access the customer by new ways, and current local loop unbundling is a favorable...

According to Ovum-RHK, the optical networking equipment sector showed in 3Q05 its largest year-over-year quarterly growth since 2002: +33% to $2,8bn. The overall optical networking market will grow 15% this year surpassing $10bn. Dell'Oro reports the...

Georges Soros has increased its stake in Motorola to 633k shares (from 55k) and in Microsoft (+130%) to 1.85m shares. Nokia is buying Intellisync, a leader in platform-independent wireless messaging and applications for mobile devices, for €360m. Nokia...