Cairo (APD) - Medi Telecom has dealt a blow to its rival Maroc Telecom, the sole provider of fixed lines telephony in Morocco with 1.3 million fixed lines, after Mdi Tlcom won the new generation of fixed-line phone license in the North African country of Morocco, the pan Arab daily, Asharq al-Awsat reported Sunday.
Agence Nationale de Rglementation des Telecommunications, the Moroccan telecom watchdog, said in a statement: "After completing the evaluation of the bids for the fixed-line phone license, Medi Telecom has won the new generation license for establishing and exploiting local and international networks."
Maroc Telecom, in which Vivendi Universal of France has a 51% stake, was not allowed to participate in bidding for the second fixed-line phone license. The bitterness of Maroc Tlcom comes as it wished any other bid would be accepted except the bid from its rival Medi Telecom.
Agence Nationale de Reglementation des Telecommunications has tendered last February for the fixed-line phone license. A total of 33 companies have expressed their interest and withdrew the license's conditions but only the three companies have submitted their bids.
The three bids came from: Maroc Connect, Egypt's Orascom Telecom Holding, who was bidding for the first time in its history for a fixed-line phone license, in addition to Medi Telecom, a subsidiary of Telefonica of Spain and Portugal Telecom, which already operates the second mobile license in Morocco.
However, the bids from Medi Telecom and Maroc Connect were short listed but Medi Telecom won the license after presenting a bid worth 75 million dirhams ($8.3 million), compared to 50 million dirhams ($5.5 million) bid from Maroc Connect. [FC]By Eman Wahby
APD (Arab Press Digest) 2005
