Dialog puts major loss down to cost of operator license

Telefonia Lokalna Dialog has recorded a net loss of zl. 154.5 million with revenues of zl. 173 million over the first half of the year. Katarzyna Muszkat, president of Dialog explained that the major reason for such a high loss is due to exchange rate differences and the fact that the company's operator license fee is calculated in euro. Dialog is hoping that the new telecommunication law, prepared by the Infrastructure Ministry, might allow them to pay these license charges with share capital, or other long-term liabilities. According to Muszkat, the new bill could be the first step to consolidate independent fixed-line operators into a new national telecom group. Dialog has to explain the loss to KGHM, its major shareholder, before it could use shares to pay the operator license fee. Dialog had almost 350,000 lines in the first half of the year (up from 335,000 subscriber lines in the first quarter) and over 50,000 lines dedicated for Internet use. The management board emphasized that its number of subscriber lines per employee is comparable to European operators like France Telecom and D eutsche Telekom. (Rzeczpospolita, p. B3) P.W.