Myanmar Launches CDMA Mobile Cellul

[darnott@xxxxxxxxxxx]

Myanmar Launches CDMA Mobile Cellular Phone System in Mogok

    Xinhua, Rangoon, 18 August 2000.The Myanmar telecommunications authorities
have launched CDMA mobile cellular phone system in Mogok, a noted gem land in
the country's Mandalay division, to enable people  n the surrounding areas
to make direct internal and external dialing.

The CDMA system, inaugurated by the Myanmar Posts and Telecommunications
(MPT) on Monday, comprises one radio station each in Mogok and nearby Kyatpyin
areas, each having a capacity of operating 500 CDMA lines at a time, 
official newspaper
The New Light of Myanmar reported Friday.

The MPT, the sole state-run enterprise undertaking telecommunications 
services,
spent 450,000 U.S. dollars plus 10.8 million Kyats (30,857 dollars) in 
setting up the
Mogok CDMA system, it said.

There has been at least 3,000 lines of CDMA phone system in operation in 
Myanmar
since its introduction in 1997.

Meanwhile, Myanmar is also introducing Global System for Mobiles GSM) cellular
phone system in the country and is striving to make 70,000 lines and 30,000 
lines
respectively available in Yangon and Mandalay, the two major cities of 
Myanmar.

According to official statistics, there are so far more than 225,000 
fixed-line
telephones and about 10,000 cellular mobiles in Myanmar. The introduction
of the GSM system is expected to, in three years' time, increases by 50 percent
  phones in use in the country, currently estimated to stand at 0.44 to
0.66 per hundred people.

Micro-wave links were also introduced in the country in 1995.