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Global Mobile joins venture

Local WiMAX license holder Global Mobile Corp (全球一動) said yesterday it had signed an agreement with Vietnamese WiMAX license holder Vietnam Multimedia Corp (VTC) for cooperation in international roaming and WiMAX service.

This was the first cooperation between WiMAX operators in Taiwan and Vietnam.

Under the deal, Global Mobile will also become the sole agent in Taiwan for VTC's multi-media content including digital TV, mobile TV, Internet TV, online gaming and online news for more than 200,000 Vietnamese workers in and immigrants in Taiwan.

Global Mobile is scheduled to launch the WiMAX service early next year.

State-owned VTC is one of four Vietnamese enterprises with the license to deploy WiMAX technology in Vietnam. It is also an official member of WiMAX Forum.

China Telecom profits drop

China Telecom Corp (中國電信), China's largest fixed-line phone carrier, says that its net profit sank 13 percent last year because of a sharp drop in connection fee income.

Widespread substitution of mobile phones for fixed-line phones led to the company's first ever decline in connection fee income, the company said yesterday.

Net profit last year fell to 23.7 billion yuan (US$3.4 billion), from 27.2 billion yuan in 2006, it said.

Overall revenue climbed 1.7 percent to 178.7 billion yuan from 175.6 billion yuan.

Chunghwa offers new plans

Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), the nation's biggest telecom operator, unveiled yesterday new and more affordable rate plans for new its generation of cellphones, aiming to boost its third-generation (3G) subscriptions.

Subscribers will now be offered three new rate packages -- with fixed monthly payments of NT$289 (US$9.50), NT$589 and NT$989 -- with a fee as low as NT$0.06 per second for all calls on or outside the Chunghwa Telecom network.

The company will also provide handset subsidies of as much as NT$8,000 for its new subscribers.

Chunghwa Telecom said it aims to expand its number of 3G users by 50 percent to 3.3 million this year. In total, the telecom company has about 8.6 million users.

The new plans apply to new 2G and 3G subscribers.

Debtors may get assistance

The Bankers Association of ROC (銀行公會) said yesterday that about 50,000 defaulted loans debtors could take advantage of the new Bankruptcy Law (消費者債務清理條例) scheduled to come into force on Thursday to clean up their debts.

Some 15 percent of the 50,000 bankruptcy filers may have taken out home mortgages, the association's consumer loan committee chairman Spike Wu (吳清文) said.

Wu yesterday urged creditors not to impose new interest rates higher than 3 percent to bankruptcy debtors who plan to enter negotiations with banks.

He said that more than 400,000 consumers entered negotiations with the association and were allowed to lower their interest rates to an average 3 percent in late 2006.

He also warned against the risks involved in asking agents to restructure loan defaults.

The association referred to agents who seek to take advantage of emerging business opportunities in debt negotiation as "frauds," as there is no way they can help negotiate a better rate for debtors.

NT drops against greenback

The New Taiwan dollar yesterday dropped NT$0.003 to close at NT$30.405 against the US dollar on turnover of US$1.465 billion.
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