Bharti Airtel has bought Qualcomm’s stake in the two firms’ Indian joint venture, giving it full control of the Wireless Business Services Pvt business with a 100% stake.

TIM Brasil has deployed 100G optical networking equipment supplied by Xtera Communications on a long-haul transmission infrastructure.

MTN Côte d’Ivoire has ordered has customised data centre from intelligent power management systems specialist Flexenclosure.

MegaFon has announced the commercial launch of the fibre-optic trunk line Dream.

ZTE Corporation has been awarded a more than 60% share of the contracts in China Mobile’s group tender for 100G Optical Transport Networking products for 2013, exceeding the combined total of all other vendors.

PCCW Global has established a direct connection to the West Africa Cable System (WACS) at Kinshasa, providing the first ever direct international undersea cable access to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

Independent a South African telecommunications infrastructure operator Metrofibre Networx has deployed packet networking solutions from Ciena to support its enhanced Ethernet managed bandwidth service offerings.

Telefonica has stated that it is “exploring strategic options” that may lead to the sale of its Czech operations.

Vodacom Tanzania has upgraded its GSM and 3G HSPA network across the country using Nokia Solutions and Networks’ Single RAN (radio access network).

The government of Mexico has reached an agreement with several licence holders that enables it to assume control of a 130MHz block of unused 2.5GHz spectrum.

China Unicom and China Telecom have reportedly been allocated spectrum that can be used to offer FDD-LTE services.

India’s Department of Telecoms has awarded Idea Cellular a Unified Licence for 7 of the country’s 22 telecom circles – Assam, Jammu & Kashmir, Kolkata, North East, Odisha, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal.

Indian operator Reliance Jio Infocomm has received approval from the country’s telecoms ministry to use its nationwide 4G spectrum to provide high-speed LTE services for voice and mobile broadband.

Deutsche Bank has partnered with the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) to acquire a 2.7% stake in the Russian fixed-line operator Rostelecom for RUB7.7 billion ($240 million).

Bolivia’s largest satellite network operator Entel has selected Gilat’s SkyEdge II solution for the government’s national digital inclusion initiative.

Tata Communications has extended its low latency network in Asia with direct connections to the National Stock Exchange of India Limited (NSE), the Singapore Exchange Limited (SGX) and the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (HKEx).

Econet Wireless is adding a new service to its EcoCash offering which will allow customers to use the service as an interest-earning savings account.

Following suggestions that TIM’s Brazilian operations could be acquired by Vodafone, Telecom Italia has dispelled claims that it is negotiating a sale of the operator in order to reduce its debt.

Bangladeshi market leader Grameenphone has begun rolling out 3G services across the country, starting in the capital city of Dhaka.

The Nokia subsidiary Here is launching a community mapping pilot program in India.

Russian private lender Bank Rossiya is reportedly looking to acquire a 50% stake of operator Tele2 Russia.

Vodacom Tanzania has lodged an additional $7 million order with Ceragon to upgrade and support backbone links across the country.

Mobile payments specialist Bango has partnered with software developer MMIT to release M-Iflọ, a safe payment solution that enables online transactions for digital content.

Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC) will launch LTE mobile data services later this year as part of its Christmas marketing campaign in The Bahamas.

ZTE has been selected by U Mobile Sdn Bhd to provide a disaster recovery (DR) system to strengthen the resilience and robustness of Malaysia’s most dynamic and innovative 3G mobile network.

The largest operator in Slovakia, Slovak Telekom, is updating its legacy charging system with a new solution from Oracle.

One of Russia’s largest operators, TTK, has launched its 100G Ultra Long Haul (ULH) DWDM network in the St. Petersburg-Moscow and Moscow-Chelyabinsk-Ekaterinburg segments.

Pakistani authorities in the Sindh province are conducting a crackdown on OTT services based on security concerns.