ITI finds no taker for its JV proposals

Indian Telephone Industries Ltd (ITI), a state-owned telecom equipment manufacturer, today said its proposal to set up joint venture (JV) companies had failed to evoke any response.

The Bangalore-based company, which achieved its highest-ever turnover of Rs 4,732.43 crore last financial year, today opened the tenders.

“Unfortunately, we have not received any proposal for the proposed JVs, and we don’t know the reasons. I am meeting the secretary to the telecom department tomorrow to discuss the next phase of action,” Ravi Agarwal, director (production) and acting CMD of ITI, told Business Standard .

According to highly placed sources in the company, three companies — US-based telecom equipment maker UTStarcom, Chinese telecom equipment maker Huawei and Indian telecom networking equipment manufacturer Tejas Networks — had bought the tender documents. “All these companies had even committed to participate in the bidding process,” the sources said.

ITI, trying to come out of the huge losses it has incurred over the years, had earlier floated bids, inviting Indian and global companies in the telecom equipment space to set up JVs at its plants in Rae Bareli, Naini and Bangalore. The company had plans to set up JVs on WiMAX technology at Rae Bareli and on Gigabit Passive Optical Network (G-PON), Gigabit Ether Passive Optical Network (GE-PON) and optical transmission equipment at Naini. In Bangalore, where ITI employs about 2,200 people, it had proposed to establish a JV on IT core system.

Even though the tender document was supposed to be opened on February 9, ITI extended this to April 5, owing to the lukewarm response it received from the interested parties. Insiders said ITI might once again extend the tender opening date after discussion with the DoT.

ITI has six manufacturing units, including three in Uttar Pradesh (Mankapur, Rae Bareli and Naini), one each at Srinagar in J&K, Palakkad in Kerala and Bangalore in Karnataka. Three out of the six units are said to be profitable. The government holds around 93 per cent stake in the 61-year-old telecom behemoth, while the remaining 7 per cent is held by the public.