TOT to decide on cellular partner by mid-Nov

Meanwhile, the TOT board has still not made a final decision on whether it will mount a legal challenge against the National Broadcasting and Telecommunication Commission (NBTC) over the plan to auction licences to the 900-megahertz spectrum on November 12. The board will meet again on October 30 to make a final decision on the matter.

Montchai said TOT was in talks with two of the four prospective business partners for the cellular unit but declined to specify their names. He hinted that one of them was a listed company that was in a dispute with TOT, while the other one was a newcomer in the telecom industry. 

Five companies – Advanced Info Service (AIS), Loxley, True Corp, Samart Corp and Mobile LTE – had originally submitted partnership proposals for TOT’s cellular-service business unit. Samart was later excluded.

AIS has been in a dispute with TOT over the ownership rights of telecom towers, while Mobile LTE is a newly established firm.

A TOT source said the state telecom agency was negotiating with AIS to determine the benefits of such a partnership. AIS has proposed that TOT would benefit to the tune of Bt4.5 billion a year from the partnership. Mobile LTE reportedly proposed around Bt7.5 billion a year in benefit to TOT.

Montchai said the partnership talks had focused on the joint expansion of TOT’s 2.1-gigahertz wireless-broadband service but TOT would have to adjust the plan, since the NBTC would consider allowing TOT to upgrade the use of bandwidth on 2.3GHz to offer wireless broadband.

Montchai said TOT had nearly finished talks with AIS on the telecom-tower dispute but had still not finalised a solution. AIS has proposed a joint venture with TOT to manage their telecom towers.