Mobile telecom tender
postponed for one month

Bidders require more time to prepare their offers

The mobile tender scheduled for today has been postponed toThursday October 8, 2015 at 9:00 AM Beirut Time.

The Bids Department of the Central Inspection Board has prolonged the deadline for submission of the tender documents to the last business day preceding October 8, 2015, before 12:00 p.m., as published on the website of the Ministry of Telecom (MoT).

Youssef Howayek, Advisor to the MoT said that the ministry is not involved with the tender, which is strictly supervised by the Bids Department.

According to a senior officer at the Bids Department, the tender was delayed to give additional time for companies to submit their offers. Nadim Khater, Chief Commercial Officer for Touch, said that this is not an unusual process.

Last month, the MoT announced the names of the companies that will participate in the mobile tender. These were English Vodafone, the world’s second largest mobile operator, with 465 million subscribers and a yearly turnover of $35 billion. But Reuters has reported that the company has dropped out of bidding for the mobile contract. Other applicants included French Orange Telecom, Turkcell, Kuwaiti Zain, Deutsche Telekom, and Malaysian Maxis.

The Bids Department refused Egypt Orascom Telecom’s application as the company’s operations did not match the tender’s criteria.