Inti, Alcatel to set up fiber optics company

Inti, Alcatel to set up fiber optics company

JAKARTA (JP): The state-owned telecommunications equipment
producer PT Inti has signed an agreement with French
telecommunications giant Alcatel to establish a joint venture
fiber optics company.

Inti director Jopie Manduapessy said Wednesday the new company
would be 70 percent owned by Alcatel and 30 percent by Inti.

Inti and Alcatel signed the joint venture agreement in
Bandung, West Java, on Jan. 7.

"The joint venture, which will produce fiber optics, will be
located near Jakarta" he said after an ISO 9002 certificate was
presented to PT Telkom's Batam branch division.

He said that Inti had decided to control no more than 30
percent of the joint venture because it wanted to concentrate on
its core business.

"Alcatel rivaled Pirelli of Italy and a Taiwanese firm before
being selected as our partner. The new company is scheduled to
start production by late this year or early 1998."

Jopie refused to provide further information on the new
company except that it was likely to be called PT Alcatel Cable
Indonesia.

Inti, whose products include telecommunications exchanges,
telephones and pay phones, is one of 10 state strategic
enterprises overseen by the Agency for the Management of
Strategic Industries, which is chaired by Minister of Research
and Technology B.J. Habibie.

Inti set up PT Indoprima Mikroselindo -- a venture with
several partners including state-owned PT Indosat and PT Yamabri
Komunikasindo, a company controlled by the Foundation of Military
Headquarters -- to operate the Personal Handy-phone System for
cellular telecommunications in Surabaya, East Java, later this
year. (icn)