March 11, 2007	Sunday	Safar 21, 1428

RIYADH, March 10: Consortia led by Verizon Communications and India's Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd are among 10 bidding for Saudi Arabia's second fixed line licence, the country's telecom regulator said on Saturday.

The licence is set to break state-controlled Saudi Telecom's monopoly over fixed-line phone services in the Arab Gulf's largest telecom market, source of around half of its revenues in 2006.

Other consortia, bidding with local partners, include Qatar Telecommunications Co, Hong Kong's PCCW, China Telecom, and KT Corp, according to a statement from the Communications and Information Technology Commission.

The commission did not give details of the offers for the licence. "During the coming weeks, the commission will study and evaluate the applications," its spokesman Sultan Al-Malik said.

STC has around 4 million fixed-line phone subscribers, which gives it a penetration rate of around 16 per cent of the kingdom's population. Internet penetration barely exceeds three per cent. CITC is expected to name the winning consortium this year. CITC will also grant a third mobile phone licence this year for which nine consortiums are bidding.

One of the bidders for the fixed-line licence is Etihad Etisalat (Mobily), which operates Saudi Arabia's second mobile phone licence. Mobily, an affiliate of Emirates Telecommunications Corp (Etisalat), has attracted 6 million mobile customers since it started operating a second mobile phone licence in May, 2005.

STC, with around 14 million mobile phone customers, has lost about 30 per cent market share to its rival.—Reuters