More trouble on the line !

We have earlier time and time again mentioned the travails of Telenor in their India venture, and now the going has gotten very rough, with apparently a full break between UNITECH and TELENOR, with litigation on the near horizon !

The perspective timewise on a possible litigation (by arbitration in Singapore, as reported in the press) is not known, but it appears that Telenor is keen on ending the cooperation with UNITECH and find a new partner in India.

This does not (as far as we understand) have any implication on the fate of the withdrawn licences - the possible new auction of the cancelled licences in the marketplace, where every operator in India could bid, would be economically very challenging, with giants like Airtel and Vodaphone eagerly trying to rake in licences from smaller competitors like Uninor.

we haven't seen the end of this, to put it mildly, and we'll continue following the matter !