DTAC is under the gun on several fronts

Total Access Communication (DTAC) has faced battles on many fronts, from a dispute over CAT Telecom's and True Corp's third-generation broadband service to reported doubts by a House subcommittee over whether its shareholding structure involved a foreigners' nominee.

Yesterday the House of Represen-tatives' science and communications subcommittee asked the Information and Communications Technology Ministry, the Finance Ministry and the Lands Department to examine further whether a nominee by foreigners held shares in DTAC, which would breach relevant laws, as the subcommittee had noticed.

The committee move was on the same day that CAT and True separately came out to defend the legitimacy of their deals of jointly providing a 3G service using high-speed packet access (HSPA) technology.

CAT chief executive officer Jirayuth Rungsrithong said his agency would discontinue talks with DTAC on its request for permission to launch the commercial 3G-HSPA service, pending consultations with the Office of the Attorney-General on how CAT should proceed with DTAC's request.

The move appears to dim DTAC's hopes of launching the commercial service in the near future. It is also seen as CAT's retaliation against DTAC for lodging a complaint against it at the Central Administrative Court on Monday. That complaint seeks a judicial review of the agreements between CAT and True Corp on their joint investment in CDMA (code division multiple access) and HSPA mobile services.

Jirayuth said CAT would soon ask the Office of the Attorney-General whether, if it decides to let DTAC launch the commercial 3G service on the 850-megahertz spectrum, this permission is subject to the Public-Private Joint Venture Act. And if DTAC can launch the service, will this amount to creating a new contract outside its concession?

DTAC has declined to comment on the matter.

The telecom operator has been waiting for years for CAT's permission to launch a commercial 3G service on its existing 850MHz spectrum. Currently, DTAC is providing a non-commercial 3G service with CAT's consent. Recently DTAC said it would never give up hope of getting such permission from CAT soon.

True CEO Supachai Chearavanont said his company would team up with CAT to defend its business from possible damage from DTAC's court complaint.

True did not want to seek a legal channel to counter-sue DTAC, but it might have to do so to defend its customers, he said.

CAT awarded the concessions of both TrueMove of True and DTAC.

Supachai said that before DTAC filed its complaint at the court on Monday, he got a text message from DTAC CEO Jon Eddy Abdullah telling him not to blame DTAC if it had to make a certain move, as DTAC had to defend its business.

If CAT does not allow DTAC to launch the commercial 3G service, Supachai said he had no sympathy for DTAC.

"It's because DTAC has no real intention to invest in 3G," he said.

Recently DTAC said it planned to expand its 3G service on 850MHz to 1,200 bases at a cost of Bt1.2 billion.

Regarding the doubts over the CAT-True deals' legitimacy, Supachai also criticised DTAC's concession amendments, which were ruled by the Council of State in 1997 of failing to comply with the Public-Private Joint Venture Act.

"If the [CAT-True] deal has to go, it's DTAC's concession that has to go first," he said.

The Council of State ruled that some concession amendments of Advanced Info Service, DTAC and also TrueMove failed to comply with the act.

In January, CAT entered into several agreements with True subsidiaries Real Move and Real Future for a tie-up to provide CDMA cellular services and 3G-HSPA services.

Under the deals, CAT will lease HSPA network equipment from Real Future subsidiary BFKT (Thailand) to provide wholesale and retail services. Real Move will also lease HSPA wholesale capacity from CAT to provide retail services.

The CAT-True deals have attracted scrutiny concerning their legitimacy from state agencies.

CAT CEO Jirayuth said DTAC could talk with CAT to lease its HSPA capacity to retail the service. He claimed that AirAsia had already shown interest in leasing HSPA capacity from CAT to provide a retail service.

CAT yesterday soft-launched its own retail 3G service under the CAT 3G brand among its staff. It will formally launch the retail service in July. Real Move launched an HSPA service in February under the TrueMove H brand by leasing capacity from CAT.