Thailand’s CAT Telecom is creating a 50/50 MVNO joint venture with local retailer Tesco Lotus, according to reports citing the state-owned telco’s acting CEO Sanpachai Huvanandana.
Thailand’s CAT Telecom is creating a 50/50 MVNO joint venture with local retailer Tesco Lotus, according to reports citing the state-owned telco’s acting CEO Sanpachai Huvanandana.
The deal will see CAT lease its 850MHz network to the JV while its partner, the Thai arm of UK-based Tesco, will develop a SIM card distribution channel, a marketing plan, and offer the mobile services. They had reportedly originally planned to have a more conventional agreement in line with CAT’s other four MVNO partners.
According to local publication The Nation, the service will initially target Tesco Lotus’ three million loyalty card users next year, and the agreement will last until CAT’s telecoms licence expires in 2025.
CAT and Tesco were unable to comment before the press deadline.
Tesco also has MVNO agreements in the UK, Ireland, Slovakia, Hungary and Czech Republic.
The news comes shortly after separate reports citing Huvanandana said CAT had pulled out of Thailand’s upcoming 4G auction, which is set to launch in November after being delayed from August 2014 following the country’s military coup.
The reports said a failure to finalise a strategic partnership with Japan’s NTT DoCoMo or South Korea’s SK Telecom, as well a requirement to declare bidding budgets, led to the decision.
Thailand’s mobile market is currently dominated by Advanced Info Service (AIS), Total Access Communication (DTAC), and True Corp.
The operators have been striking up tower sharing partnerships as the spectrum auction delay and falling voice service revenues weigh on their businesses.
Telenor-owned DTAC and Truegif, a fund partly held by True, agreed the first infrastructure sharing deal in October 2014. DTAC has also recently agreed separate tower sharing projects with AIS and CAT.
