SK Telecom, the largest mobile phone operator of South Korea, has expressed its interest to buy some stakes in the state-owned mobile phone operator, Teletalk Bangladesh Limited, to foray into the country's booming mobile phone market.
We received a letter from the SK Telecom in late January showing its interest to invest in Teletalk,' said high official of the posts and telecommunications ministry Thursday. He said the government is actively considering the proposal aiming to give a fresh lease of life to the ailing mobile phone operator now struggling for subscribers amid poor network and coverage. Teletalk is the minnows among the six mobile phone operators in the country with only one million subscribers. Officials of the telecoms ministry said they had already sent a letter to the South Korean company to come up with a `specific' and `detail' proposal' on how it could pour investment in Teletalk which required big financial push for the expansion of its network and improvement of coverage to grab more subscribers. SK Telecom which controls more than 50 per cent market share in South Korea's mobile market has also investment in China and Vietnam. Industry analysts said the possible tie-up with the SK Telecom would help the Teletalk from being ruined in the country's highly competitive mobile phone market.Since the launch of its commercial service in March 2005 with much fan fare, Teletalk has failed to expand its network and coverage substantially to cannibalise the market share of its rival operators because of financial constraints and lengthy bureaucratic process of taking major decisions. The company so far has invested around Tk 800 crore to spread its network and coverage to all the districts except the three hill districts. It also got a positive nod in February from its 11-member board, mostly comprising bureaucrats, to invest another Tk 542 core for network expansion aimed at acquiring 18 lakh more subscribers by the end of 2008. Bangladesh, one of the ten fastest growing mobile phone markets, is increasingly attracting global giants to invest in the telecom sector as the growth prospect is still very high amid lower mobile penetration in the country. The mobile penetration in the country is still well below the 25 per cent and industry insider says there is much room for any operators to grow. In February, a high profile team of Vodafone, the world's largest mobile phone operator by revenue, came to Bangladesh and held negotiations with local AK Khan Group to buy its 30 per cent stakes in Aktel, the third largest operator to make its way into Bangladesh's booming telecoms market. Telekom Malaysia International owns the rest 70 per cent stakes of the company. Gavin Darby, CEO of Vodafone's Asia, Africa and China operations, who led the team, said Vodafone was excited by the growth possibilities in Bangladesh and looking for opportunities to invest here. The country's number of mobile phone users stood at 37.55 million at the end February, according to the BTRC. Last year, the mobile subscription registered a 58 per cent growth. Rashid Khan, chief executive officer of country's third largest mobile phone operator Banglalink, recently said the number of mobile phone subscribers would reach to 50 million by the end of 2008. Souce: http://www.newagebd.com/busi.html _
