12 May 2004	Wednesday	21 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1425

KARACHI, May 11: Some 92 applicants have got themselves registered with the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority for operation of fix telephone service in the country.

Another 25 had been registered for the Long Distance International service, PTA Chairman Shahzada Alam Malik said, while speaking at a press conference on Tuesday. He said the PTA, as part of its telecom deregulatory policy, had invited applications for operation of fix telephone service, for which May 31 was the last date.

On expiring of the date, the applications received would be scrutinized and those meeting the criteria would be issued licences in June, he added. He explained that the licences would be issued for two categories, Local Loop (like the one being operated by PTCL) and LDI.

He said the LDI category applicants would have to lay fibre optic, while the licences would also be issued for satellite and under ocean fibre optic for overseas operations.

Mr Malik pointed out that response in this regard was very good and big companies like Telenor of Norway and Vared of Abu Dhabi were showing interest in getting licences.

To a question, he said that applicants entering the fix telephone operations would not have to face any restricted licensing, but they could get as many licences as they liked.

He said that fee for Local Loop licence would be $10,000 and it would be $0.5 million for LDI licence to be valid for 20 years period. He said the companies, which had been issued licence for LDI service, would also have to furnish a performance bond of $10 million.

He said that there would be no bidding in respect of Local Loop and LDI services, but those applying for wireless operation would have to bid for the frequency which was limited.

Claiming growth in the telecommunications sector, he said issuing of licences to two cellular companies in the country recently, had compelled the existing companies to launch aggressive marketing campaigns to capture maximum market share.

He said the Ufone had already reduced its activation fee, while the government was considering to bring it down further. To a question, Mr Malik said that for wireless local loop, separate licences would be issued.

He told another questioner that in the field of cellular telephony, more licences could not be issued for the time being because of frequency limitations, adding that hopefully, PTA would get enhanced frequency band. However, he made it clear that the existing policy would remain unchanged for the next five years and no new licence would be issued during this period.

Replying to a question, PTA chairman pointed out that initially the authority had prescribed a particular type of cellular telephones to be used in the country, but this restriction had now been lifted, allowing the people to use any type of cellular phones.

To another question that whether the PTCL was contemplating to provide more incentives to its customers, Mr Malik pointed out that the company had already reduced line rent from Rs300 to Rs200, besides reducing charges for long-distance and overseas calls and also increased the duration of local calls to 10 minutes during off-peak hours.

He told a questioner that the PTA might consider further increase in the duration of a local call, but the existing local call charges could not be cut down further.

He pointed out that the PTA had carried out a study regarding local call charges in comparison with those in the neighbouring and Saarc countries, finding the charges appropriate. However, he said, the PTCL was likely to further reduce the long-distance and overseas call charges. He said that two companies, which had been issued licences for cellular telephone operation, were expected to start their operations in six to eight months. -APP