By mid-2008, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, BSNL, will offer CDMA services to mobile users across the country.
The application rendered by BSNL for a full-fledged CDMA mobility license has been approved. Since BSNL is State-owned, it was exempted from shelling out Rs 1,651-crores entry fee, performance bank guarantee fee etc for the CDMA license.
“The initial investment for this project will be approximately $500 million,” said BSNL CMD, Kuldeep Goyal.
BSNL has 70 million customers nation-wide and intends to expand the numbers with the introduction of CDMA services. They claim that they will be able to take 20% of the market share under their fold in one year. Do Reliance and TATA Indicom have something to mull over?
Even while most CDMA users swear by the reliability of our connections, we feel short changed as far as choice of handsets goes. We can only hope that BSNL can redeem us and in the process, maybe, guarantee switch-over customers as well.
Via: NDTV.com