The home ministry is likely to give a conditional nod to US-based Telcordia Technologies to function as one of the two clearing houses for managing number portability in the country.
Mobile number portability (MNP), which allows the consumer to change the service provider while retaining the phone number, has been put-off by the government on one pretext or the other for the last two years. The fresh deadline for implementing the same is October, 31.
The country has been split into two zones and Syniverse Technologies India and MNP Interconnection, a joint venture between US-based Telcordia Technologies and Deepak Talwar Consultants Ltd, would act as the clearing houses in the respective zones to manage porting activities.
However, the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) hasn?t so far accorded clearance to Telcordia on security grounds since it has operations in Pakistan as well.
The FIPB had deliberated on Telcordia?s proposal for over eight months and deferred it several times due to objections raised by the home ministry. Recently, US?s national security advisor met home minister P Chidambaram and apprised him that Telcordia?s operations in Pakistan are in the nature of providing vendor services, which is quite different from what the company plans to do in India. It is learnt that the home ministry has now taken up the proposal afresh and considered giving a conditional nod to them while concurrently investigating the Pakistan angle.
Telcordia had an equipment supply agreement with a vendor in Pakistan that ended last November. The communication, finance, commerce and other ministries had all said that they had no objections to the proposal. Telcordia, in its appeal to the FIPB, had said the company operates as a vendor in Pakistan and operations are limited to that extent only.
The home ministry had earlier decided to attach a rider that none of the staff of the US-based telecom firm who have worked in Pakistan at any point of time can be employed in the Indian operations. It had also said that the CEO of the Indian arm, a 74:26 JV between Telcordia Technologies and Deepak Talwar Consultants, will have to be an Indian.
Indian regulations do not allow more than 74% foreign holdings in any company that offers communications and related services.