Indosat ties up with Mega Asia
JAKARTA: Telecommunications firm Indosat signed on Wednesday a preliminary agreement with Mega Asia Consortium for the development of a fixed wireless network in Jakarta and Surabaya over the next three years.
Under the preliminary agreement, the consortium will develop 450,000 fixed wireless lines in Jakarta and surrounding areas and another 250,000 lines in Surabaya and surrounding areas during the three-year period, Indosat said in a statement.
The consortium comprises Bakrie Communication Company, Tomen Corporation, PT Asiabumi Piramida and PT Saranainsan Muda Selaras.
The consortium will secure its own finances to build the network based on Indosat's license.
It will operate the network for about 10 years, with the revenue to be shared with Indosat. After 10 years of operation, the consortium will transfer the network to Indosat.
"The revenue-sharing contract period could be longer or shorter, depending on the return on the project's investment," Indosat said.
The project will use CDMA 2000-1X technology. The capital expenditure for the project is estimated at US$164 per line or about $115 million for the total 700,000 lines. -- JP
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- New firm buys out M-Web assets JP/14/Indo
New firm buys out M-Web assets
JAKARTA: PT Indonesia Media Technologies (IMF), a newly-formed media technology company, has acquired Astaga.com, Kafegaul.com, satunet.com and other key assets owned by PT M-Web Indonesia, which has decided to pull out of Indonesia.
IMT was formed by a group of local and foreign technology investors and entrepreneurs to capitalize on the business built up by M-Web over the last three years, IMT said in a statement on Tuesday.
With the acquisition, IMT said it will be the new owner of the three websites and shall continue providing mobile- and media- related services.
South Africa-based M-Web, which until last year was the country's largest Internet firm, has sold all its assets in Indonesia on sagging confidence in the prospects for Indonesia's internet industry.
"IMT is poised to capitalize on the growing media technology and mobile service market," company president and CEO David Burke said. -- JP
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- Garuda receives award from Airbus JP/14/Indo
Garuda receives award from Airbus
JAKARTA: National flag-carrier Garuda Indonesia has received an award from Europe aircraft maker Airbus Industrie for its performance in operating A-330 aircraft.
Garuda said in a statement that the Operational Reliability Award was delivered by Airbus vice president for A-330/A-340 program John Grother to Garuda's technical director Richard B.S. here on Monday.
The "dispatch reliability" of six A-330 aircraft now being operated by Garuda reached 98.58 percent in 2002, the company said, adding this had contributed to the airline's punctuality.
Garuda has been operating the six aircraft since December 1996. It now uses the aircraft to serve regional destinations, including Japan (Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Fukuoka), Australia (Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth, Melbourne, Sydney), China (Guangzhou, Shanghai). -- JP
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- Indonesian airline opens flights to Ipoh JP/14/Indo
Indonesian airline opens flights to Ipoh
JAKARTA: Indonesia's Jatayu Airlines has opened a new route linking Medan in North Sumatra to the north Malaysian city of Ipoh, a report said Wednesday.
A Boeing 737-200 will fly the route on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, the manager of Jatayu's Medan office, Kanida, told the state Antara news agency.
The first flight to Ipoh took off on Tuesday, Kanida said. Jatayu already has daily flights linking Medan to another Malaysian destination, Penang. -- AFP
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- BHP Steel expands Asia production JP/14/Indo
BHP Steel expands Asia production
MELBOURNE: BHP Steel Ltd. has opened two new plants in China, lifting its Asian network to 21 plants, The Age newspaper reports on Wednesday.
One of the new roll-forming plants is near Beijing, located to capitalize on the construction activity prompted by the 2008 Olympic Games, while the second plant is based in the western province of Sichuan.
The plants draw high-value-added feedstock from BHP Steel's three Asian painting and coating mills in Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia, the newspaper reported. -- Dow Jones
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- Shell evacuates staff from Gulf JP/14/Indo
Shell evacuates staff from Gulf
TEHRAN: Anglo-Dutch oil giant Royal Dutch/Shell pulled 260 Iranian and expatriate staff out of the Sorush and Nowruz oilfields in the northern Gulf late Tuesday because of the looming U.S.-led war on Iraq, a company spokesman told AFP.
"Iranian staff were brought ashore in Iran while our foreign employees were sent to Dubai," said Ali Kalali, without indicating how many of the personnel were expatriates.
The spokesman said the company's operations in the two offshore fields would resume as soon as security conditions permitted. -- AFP
;JP;Agencies ANPAf..r.. CorporateBrief- Holcim suffers 37.7% decline in profit JP/14/Indo
Holcim suffers 37.7% decline in profit
ZURICH: The Swiss cement giant, Holcim, announced on Wednesday a 37.7 percent drop in net profit for 2002 to 506 million Swiss francs (349 million euros).
Turnover fell by 4.6 percent to 13 billion Swiss francs, the group said in a statement.
Holcim, one of the world's largest cement groups, blamed its results on a provision of 120 million Swiss francs for pending legal proceedings by the anti-cartel authority in Germany, write- offs of CHF 63 million in Argentina as well as on its investment in the airline 'Swiss'.
Holcim employed 51,115 people worldwide at the end of 2002, and increase of 7.9 percent over the previous year.
The cement group, which is heavily dependent on the state of the construction industry, indicated it was ready to weather economic conditions in 2003.
"Thanks to the restructuring measures implemented, Holcim is well equipped to achieve robust results even if the global economy takes a further turn for the worse," it said. -- AFP