Our Bureau

New Delhi , Feb. 17

GLOBAL telecom equipment vendors, including Nokia and Alcatel, on Thursday affirmed their plans to make India a manufacturing hub. At a meeting with the Communication and IT Minister, Mr Dayanidhi Maran, Mr Serge Tchuruk, Chairman, Alcatel, announced that the company was examining the possibility of setting up a global research centre on WiMax in India.

Mr Maran had meetings with other international vendors, including Ericsson, Lucent, Motorola, Nokia and Nortel, on the sidelines of the ongoing GSM World Congress at Cannes, France. The Minister also met the GSM Association Board Members.

Mr Jorge Ollila, Chairman & CEO, Nokia, affirmed that the company's ntention to set up a handset-manufacturing unit and also indicated that they would set up a committee to look into the possibility of infrastructure manufacture. He also agreed to bring the company's board members to India in May to finalise the issue.

Mr Simon Leung, Senior Vice-President, Asia Pacific, Motorola, indicated that the company would explore the possibility of setting up a manufacturing base in India.

Mr Carl Svanberg, CEO, Ericsson, reiterated that the company intended to set up an infrastructure manufacturing unit.

Mr Maran apprised the manufacturers about the various policy initiatives taken by the Government of India in the telecom sector.

During the meeting with the GSM Association Board, GSMA along with Motorola, announced a special initiative to launch a $30-handset for emerging markets. Mr Maran stated that this initiative would improve the affordability and help expand the market faster. In another meeting between Mr Maran and the EU Commissioner, Mr Reding, it was decided that both India and the European Union (EU) would jointly address the telecom issues pertaining to security, inter-operability, content and roaming in the next Joint Working Group meeting to be held in May.

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