News in Brief

- Few mobile operators will have missed the opportunity to promote SMS Valentine cards this year. Customers of M1 in Singapore were particularly affectionate; the operator reports 3.7 million text messages sent on or around the day and 2000 greeting cards were ordered by SMS. This equates to 1.2 messages

- Hong Kong's regulator, which is to issue four 3G licences in the middle of the year in a 'hybrid selection process', is to require licensees to make up to 30 per cent of their network capacity available for resale through MVNOs. Although this is a model that has been talked about for 3G licensing, Hong Kong is the first to make it a requirement.

- Australia has accepted bids for its March 2001 auction of 3G spectrum, attracting seven bidders. Telstra, C&W Optus, AAPT Spectrum (Telecom NZ), Vodafone Pacific, CKW Wireless (Qualcomm), 3G Investments Australia (ArrayCom) and Hutchison Telecoms are in the running. The government hopes to raise A$2.6 billion from the auction, but neighbouring New Zealand's 2G and 3G auctions raised a mere NZ$133.58 million.

- Youngwoo Telecom has signed a deal worth $15 million to supply Japan's second mobile carrier KDDI with mobile telecoms equipment. Youngwoo will supply laser, optical and small repeaters and it will pilot beacon systems in order to prevent call disruption.

- SK Telecom in Korea is to trial the RadioCamera system of US Wireless Corporation, a provider of wireless location information, after signing an MoU with its Korean joint venture Wireless Technology Inc (WTI). WTI and SK plan to develop applications and services based on RadioCamera positioning. Developed to comply with US E-911 regulations, RadioCamera needs only one point of reference to locate the user; it does not depend on line-of-sight and it does not require new handsets. It is thus a cheaper option than systems using triangulation and suitable for dense urban environments such as Korean cities.

- NEC plans to enter the PDA market by autumn. The company plans to develop products fostering the communication of data information between PCs and mobile devices by means of Bluetooth, which will be released in Japan by September.

- Number two mobile operator China Unicom has confirmed that it will, after all, build a narrowband CDMA network across 160 cities, after it inherited the trial CDMA networks from Great Wall Telecom in July 2000.

- Infrastructure deals are still booming in China. Through Eastcom, Motorola has won two contracts with China Mobile totalling $13 million, a GSM1800 overlay to the GSM900 network in two major cities in Heilongjiang province and a GSM900 network expansion in Yunan province. Nokia has won a contract to supply a GSM1800 network in Qiqihaer City in Heilongjiang.