Operators

Chinese equipment vendor ZTE has reported strong double-digit growth in both revenue and profit for the first half of the year on the back of strong demand for 3G equipment in its domestic market.

Merger talks between India's Bharti and South Africa's MTN could be extended for a second time amid reports that MTN's shareholders are becoming increasingly frustrated with the negotiations.

India's Reliance Communications (RCom) is the latest name to be linked to an acquisition of Zain's African mobile networks.

Japan's second-largest operator KDDI today revealed further plans for its launch of LTE networks, announcing Motorola and NEC as suppliers of radio access (base station) kit and declaring commercial availability by December 2012.

China Mobile - the world's largest operator by subscribers - is feeling the effects of the global downturn and increasing competition in its home market after posting its slowest growth in interim profit since the company listed in 1997.

TeleGeography, citing a bdnews24.com report, notes that GrameenPhone's IPO could be open for subscription in the last week of September, after receiving final regulatory approval yesterday.

US regulator the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will next Thursday hold a meeting in Washington aimed at launching a wide-ranging review of the country's mobile industry practices, looking at issues from the state of competition in the market to the fees added on to subscribers' bills.