Powergrid Shortlists 8 Firms For Ofc Tender

The tender will be open in a few months. The shortlisted companies and consortia are: ABB-Focas (UK), Cegelec (France), Fujikura-NEC and Fujikawa-NTT-Fujitsu (both from Japan), Siemens (Germany), Pirelli (Italy), Nortel-DICC (UK) and Ericsson-Nera (Norway).

Six other companies Siemens, ABB, Cegelec, Nera, Nortel and Harris Farnone have been found eligible for participating in supplying tenders for microwave radios.

Apart from the size of the tender, the optical fibre cables project of Power Grid Corporation has generated a lot of interest as it is for the first time that an organisation other than the department of telecommunications is laying out a long-distance telecom transmission network in the country.

It will also be the largest such network in the country.

Since optical fibre cables carriers are to be laid atop PowerGrid's high-tension power line towers, support infrastructure costs will be very low.

The optical fibre cables network will serve as a backbone network to meet the transmission needs of department of telecommunications and private operators. PowerGrid expects to lease out capacity to such users.

PowerGrid had asked for proposals from companies/consortia which could take up the project on a turnkey basis.

Since it involves working on live high-tension power lines, specialised inputs and skills are required for the project and the Power Grid Corporation appraisal was to ascertain such capabilities.The optical fibre cables network is being set up on lines of Energis, the communication arm of National Grid of the UK.