Disqus
The French government has finally opened the bidding for the country’s fourth 3G license! Reserve price is set at 240 million EUR (about $339 million), and France Telecom said it will appeal against the license fee, because it’s too low compared to what the incumbent operators have paid. I don’t buy the argument, as the new operator will have to spend a fortune on marketing and network build-out to get its piece of the action in the highly penetrated market.
The deadline is set for October 29th, and the license is expected to be awarded around June 2010.
Iliad, the parent company of the popular ISP – Free, confirmed it will bid for a license. Other potential candidates include Virgin Mobile France in JV with Numericable, and Egypt’s Orascom Telecom.
For the record, France has three incumbent operators: Orange which holds 47% of the market, SFR – 36%, and Bouygues Télécom holding 17% marketshare.
[Via: CellularNews]
About The Author
Dusan Belic
Dusan has been using smartphones since their introduction and is now following the latest trends in the industry. The "convergence" is what he's most excited about, and writing about it is the next logical thing to do. He thinks that using a smartphone is what everyone who cares about their time should do. In addition to his interests in mobile phones, Dusan also loves to experiment with the latest web and mobile 2.0 services. The idea of accessing and managing your information from any device no matter where you are simply amazes him. Whether it's an online to-do list, note taking service or a video sharing social network, he's there to try it out. He admits though, he's still searching for the ultimate web-based organizational tool, which "sings" perfectly with the mobile PIM application. Dusan used to run SymbianWatch.com which later became part of IntoMobile. He lives in Serbia, South-East Europe, from where he edits the site on a daily basis.
