WCA November 2008

fresh interest in e-reading of periodicals. Through its Orange cellular network, France Télécom, which stresses that it is not entering the news business, will provide users with frequently updated material from such major publications as Le Monde and Le Figaro. The service will be available exclusively in France. The non-profit Internet rights group ✆ ✆ Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is suing US president, George W Bush and members of his administration over their monitoring of e-mails and telephone calls without court-approved warrants. The San Francisco-based civil liberties group filed the lawsuit on 18 th September against the National Security Agency (NSA) and other government agencies on behalf of AT&T customers, to stop the “illegal, unconstitutional, and ongoing dragnet surveillance of their communications and records.”

Telecom regions, municipalities, and financial sup- port from the European Union are expected to cover the remaining costs. According to the Finnish communications regulatory auth- ority FICORA, at mid-2008 there were some 1.92 million broadband subscriptions in the country, which has a population of 5.3 million. Following a first phase of at least 1 Megabyte per second (Maps) by 2010, Helsinki hopes to offer all Finnish households connection speeds of at least 100 Megabits (Mbps) by 2016. KT Corp, the leading fixed-line ✆ ✆ and broadband provider in South Korea, said on 18 th September that it would put $1.5 billion into Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) by 2012 and expected to break even on its investment as early as 2011. As noted by Reuters, after a long debate among broadcasters, telecom operators and South Korean authorities, the country passed a law in December allowing full IPTV service including real-time TV. KT Corp told reporters in Seoul that it hoped to enrol 300,000 subscribers for its real-time IPTV by the end of 2008, and bring the total to 3 million in 2012. It has 6.7 million broadband subscribers – nearly 45% of the home market, where it competes with hanarotelecom inc KT is to begin offering full IPTV service in October. France Télécom completed the ✆ ✆ trial of its e-reader prototype in September and said it expected to start distributing the “Read & Go” – in conjunction with a subscription-based news service of the same name – by the end of the year. For a monthly charge similar to a mobile service plan, customers will be able to access a stream of content from a wide assortment of newspapers and other information sources, to- gether with advertising that helps defray the cost of the service. Digital books have not enjoyed notable success, but the popular Amazon Kindle and the Sony Reader have sparked operators,

Carl-Henric Svanberg, chief executive of Ericsson, said on 20 th August that his Stockholm- based company’s connection with STMicro would enable it to provide “a complete offering.” The largest phone company ✆ ✆ in Southeast Asia, Singapore Telecommunications, reported a second-quarter profit that fell more than analysts had expected. While sales rose 5.9%, to $2.7 billion, net income fell 5.3%, to $623 million. SingTel said strength in the Singapore dollar would erode overseas earnings this year. Profit from its mobile affiliates declined for the first time in 13 quarters. SingTel generates about three- quarters of its total sales from its Australian telecom arm Optus as well as other regional associates in Indonesia, India, Thailand, and the Philippines. In the quarter ended 30 th June the Singapore dollar rose an average 7% against the Indonesian rupiah, the Philippine peso, the Thai baht, and the Indian rupee. Spain’s Telefónica intends to ✆ ✆ acquire 100% of the Chilean fixed-line telecom Telefónica Chile for some $984 million, according to an 11 th September notification to the Madrid stock exchange. The Spanish company was to launch a tender offer through its wholly owned subsidiary Inversiones Telefónica Internacional Holding to acquire all outstanding shares of Telefónica Chile and thus gain the 55.1% stake that it does not already own. The plan would require a change in a 45% ownership restriction currently imposed by the Chilean company. Citing a report by Agence ✆ ✆ France Presse, telecomasia. net said on 22 nd September that the Finnish government intends to offer high-speed broadband connections to nearly all Finns by the end of 2015. The estimated $289 million cost of building fibre optic cable networks be- yond commercially viable areas, in a bid to boost productivity, is to be borne one-third (around $97 million) by the government.

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Wire & Cable ASIA – November/December 2008