Netia protesting UMTS licenses, wants in on the action

Fixed-line telecom operator Netia has asked the Telecoms Ministry not to award UMTS mobile telecom licenses to Poland's three GSM operators, or to allow it to bid for one on the same terms. After the Ministry failed to receive a sufficient number of bids in the UMTS auction earlier this month, it decided to extend the GSM licenses of the three operators by granting them UMTS permits. According to Netia, this constitutes a discrimination of other telecom operators, such as itself, who had been considering participating in the auction. Thus it is demanding that the Ministry either award no licenses and open a new UMTS tender in 2002, or allow it to bid for a license now on the same terms as GSM operators. Meanwhile, Miroslaw Marcinkiewicz, general director at the Telecoms Ministry, said yesterday that the Netia motion will certainly not interfere with the UMTS license extension to GSM operators. He said the Ministry will issue a statement on the situation today. (Reuters, Puls Biznesu, p.3) P.J.