Myanmar attracts at least 2 potential bidders for phone licenses

Myanmar attracts at least 2 potential bidders for phone licenses

Myanmar attracted at least two expressions of interest for telecommunications licenses to be issued as the nation tries to boost one of Asia’s lowest phone penetration rates following decades of military rule.

Axiata Group Bhd. (AXIATA), Malaysia’s biggest mobile-phone company by market value, said it submitted an expression of interest to the Myanmar government before today’s deadline. Singapore’s ST Telemedia Pte, a unit of Temasek Holdings Pte, also indicated its plan to bid, said Melinda Tan, a company spokeswoman.

“It is a logical and interesting market to consider investing in,” Axiata said in an e-mailed statement to Bloomberg News. “It represents a strategic market given its high growth potential.”

Myanmar is offering two licenses to boost telecom coverage to as much as 80 percent of the country by 2016, the government said Jan. 15 when inviting foreign companies to submit bids. Myanmar’s 5.44 million mobile-phone subscribers as of last month amounted to a 9 percent penetration rate, compared with 70 percent in Cambodia, 87 percent in Laos and more than 100 percent in Thailand, the ministry said. The country has a fixed- line penetration rate of about 1 percent, it said.

Than Zaw, a director at the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, said today that a statement would be released, without giving a timeframe. Deputy Minister Maung Maung Thein at the Ministry of Finance and Revenue, who is a member of the selection board, said he has not yet been informed about the process. Ye Htut, a spokesman for President Thein Sein, was not immediately available to comment.

Creating framework

The licenses will be issued by June and may last as long as 20 years with an option for renewal, the government said on Jan. 15. Myanmar’s parliament may approve a draft telecommunications law, which will include the creation of an independent regulator by 2015, in the first half of this year, it said.

The country of 64 million people has one of the lowest per- capita gross domestic products in Asia, according to International Monetary Fund estimates.

Kuala Lumpur-based Axiata already has mobile-phone interests in countries including India, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

ST Telemedia owns stakes in technology and telecommunications companies including StarHub Ltd. (STH), Singapore’s second-biggest phone company. It also holds shares of mobile- phone companies in Malaysia and Vietnam, as well as the biggest cable-TV operator in the Philippines.

bloomberg