Chinese firms eye Rs 6,000cr BSNL tender

Chinese telecom manufacturers ZTE and Huawei are planning to bid for the Rs 6,000-crore mega tender floated by Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) for installing 12 million GSM (global system for mobiles) lines.

According to industry sources, the Chinese companies are negotiating with BSNL to relax the eligibility norms, which require bidders to have experience in setting up cellular networks in more than 10 countries.

BSNL executives said the conditions were deliberately stringent to keep away inexperienced manufacturers. "This is the world's largest tender and we do not want manufacturers with low-scale operations to jeopardise our expansion plans. The clause has been put in place to check unreliable and non-serious players and is not targeted at any specific company," a senior BSNL executive said.

The executives said all major manufacturers, including Motorola, Nortel, Ericsson, Siemens and Alcatel would be eligible for the bidding. "The tender conditions were prepared after consulting the manufacturers. We received representation from all the companies. It would not be fair to say BSNL's tender caters to only a few," said an executive.

They further said that BSNL had no intention of keeping out any Chinese or Indian manufacturer. BSNL was already out of capacity in most circles and had to expedite the tendering process.

Eligibility criteria

• The Chinese companies are negotiating with BSNL to relax the eligibility norms
• The norms require bidders to have experience in setting up cellular networks in more than 10 countries
• BSNL executives said the conditions were deliberately stringent to keep away inexperienced manufacturers