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G. Rambabu

SEOUL, Dec.16

EVEN as the tariff plan for limited mobility services submitted by Reliance Communications Ltd is being "studied" by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), the company has pegged its subscriber base during the first year of operations at close to six million.

This works out to an astonishing 60 per cent of the existing mobile market that the cellular operators have painfully notched up over the past seven years. Reliance, which is launching its operations on December 28, hopes to notch up this number by end-December 2003 through a slew of incentives to the subscribers at tariff rates, which are the lowest in the market.

The magic number was disclosed by senior officials of South Korean conglomerates LG Electronics (LGE) and Samsung who are in the race to bag the prestigious order for code division multiple access (CDMA) handsets, which will be bundled with the limited mobility services of the company.

Both the companies are known leaders in the CDMA handset and equipment business, having catered to the South Korean market for more than eight years now.

While LGE is the acknowledged leader in the CDMA world market having garnered a market share of over 60 per cent, Samsung comes second with a share of a little under 35 per cent.

LGE officials pointed out that while the company has already bagged an order from Reliance Communications Ltd worth $100 million for delivery of handsets that are to be bundled with the limited mobility connection, it hopes to bag a major chunk of the remaining market too. They said that the current order includes supply of three kinds of CDMA2001x handset models such as bar-type, 4-grey dual-folder type and colour dual-folder type.

``In accordance with the reception orders, it is expected that LGE and Reliance will establish a long-term business system to invigorate the Indian CDMA market. It is also expected that the net volume will substantially increase leading to the expansion of sales. We are even thinking of establishing a local manufacturing unit in India to improve the price competitiveness. LG has put great effort to develop the mobile telecommunication industry in India and we hope to take a leading role in modernising the telecom sector in the country,'' they said. Along with the handset order from Reliance, they noted that LG has also been awarded the contract for extension of the wireless in local loop (WLL) network of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd. In addition to the recent supply contract of expanding 3.5 lakh WLL lines in urban areas, LGE was again chosen to expand 2.7 lakh CDMA WLL lines for suburban regions, they said.

As regards Samsung's plans for the CDMA market, the company's officials refused to divulge the full details of the deal with Reliance stating that they had sworn them to secrecy.

They did, however, mention that the company had bagged a multi-million dollar contract for supply of switches and other network equipment that will be deployed in phase two of Reliance's rollout. The company is also in talks with other basic operators including BSNL for bundling of their services with its range of CDMA handsets.

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