Metaswitch Networks , ZTE Corp. (Shenzhen: 000063; Hong Kong: 0763)
and Orange (NYSE: FTE) are all up to something in today's roundup of news from the EMEA region.
Metaswitch has added to its growing technology portfolio with the acquisition of Norwegian instant messaging and presence applications specialist Colibria AS . (See Metaswitch Makes Its LTE Apps Move.)
Russian operator Mobile TeleSystems OJSC (MTS) (NYSE: MBT), which has just acquired Siberia's Inteleca, has revealed its fourth-quarter financials for 2010. Net income is up 36.1 percent to $1.38 billion year-on-year but sequentially the news isn't so good -- net income was down 67.7 percent in the fourth quarter compared to the preceding period. (See MTS Acquires Russian Altnet and Euronews: April 5.)
Moroccan mobile startup Inwi has signed up 5 million customers and grabbed a 13.5 percent market share in its first 12 months of operations. (See Inwi Grabs Market Share in Morocco .)
A group of U.K. Internet service providers, Virgin Media Inc. (Nasdaq: VMED) and TalkTalk among them, have written an open letter to Communications Minister Ed Vaizey complaining about BT Group plc (NYSE: BT; London: BTA)'s "duct and pole" access charges, the BBC reports. BT charges from £0.95 (US$1.35) a meter for duct sharing and £21 ($30) per pole attachment. (See BT Tables Duct & Pole Proposals.)
— Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading