Simoco Buyout Of Philips Telecom By Mid-98

The UK-based $300 million radio communications major Simoco International, which currently has a 51 per cent stake in Philips Telecommunications Industries (PTIL), will buy the latters entire stake by mid-next year.

Simoco has applied to the registrar of companies (RoC) for renaming its Indian subsidiary Simoco Telecommuni-cations Asia South. It is likely to get the RoC clearance in a month. Backed by the UK venture capital firm Cinven, Simoco acquired Philips worldwide private mobile radio division for $75 million a year ago. The deal included Philips manufacturing facilities in Australia, UK, France and Calcutta in India.

Simoco has made an headway in developing an advanced generation of terrestrial trunk radio access (Tetra) solutions, the emerging international standard for digital mobile radio communications, for voice and data.

Tetra, which has been launched in the UK, will soon be available in India. Simoco will demonstrate this new standard for the first time in the country in September.

The radio communications market in India is set for rapid expansion and Simoco is augmenting its operations to garner a fair share of the market. Besides targeting the Indian market it has chalked out plans to make the country the supply centre for its other global businesses.

It has already set up a trunked radio equipment test bed at Philips manufacturing facility in Calcutta and has established a systems integration facility at Salt Lake which will be made available to private radio trunking operators.

The company is targeting the mobile radio trunking services (MRTS) and products for the emerging private trunked mobile radio networks. The service uses the broadcast mode of communication meant for group or closed user groups targeted for safety organisations, defence, mining, industry etc. These can also be customised as per requirement.

Simoco manufactures a range of products for voice and data communication, including mobile radio, hand-held radios, automatic vehicle location, GIS mapping products and complete engineering design and project management services.