Myanmar Telecoms Licenses by Telenor and Ooredoo

Telenor and Ooredoo Wins Myanmar Telecoms Licenses

T­he Myanmar government has awarded the two mobile operator licenses -- to Telenor and Qatar's Ooredoo.

In a statement, the Myanmar ICT Ministry said that the two companies have won the licenses, although as the final details are still to be signed, the Ministry also named a consortium consisting of Orange and Marubeni as the back-up winner should one of the other two companies not sign the license agreement.

The tender was based on a beauty contest model, although out of the 1,000 points on offer, 500 points were based on the price being paid for the license.

Each successful applicant made binding commitments regarding the launch and roll-out of its service with quality of services commitments. The ministry said that the offered rollout plans exceed the minimum requirements set in the tender for a minimum of 75% geographic coverage for each region and state for voice 5 years after the effective licence date.

Telenor has confirmed that it has been declared a successful applicant for licence and said that it will deploy a 3G/LTE network with the initial launch expected sometime next year.

At the time of writing, Ooredoo hasn't issued a statement.

In a statement confirming that the company has won the license, the Chairman of Ooredoo, said, "Myanmar will undoubtedly become a key market for Ooredoo as we build out our network and deliver easy-to-use, customer friendly and life-enhancing services to the people of Myanmar."

According to the latest official data, as of end of December 2012, the current mobile base is 5.44 million subscribers equivalent to just  9% population penetration. 3.62 million or 67% of mobile subscribers are using GSM, 0.74 million or 14% are using WCDMA, 1.1 million or 20% are using CDMA.