Alcatel NV and Siemens AG have been chosen to lead the overhaul of Slovakia’s decrepit telecommunications system, Reuter reports from Bratislava: The country has been divided between two zones – Alcatel and Siemens; we’re a small country, and two types of switching systems are enough, Peter Anetta, head of project implementation for Slovak Telecom sp, told the news agency; the $500m, and subsidiaries of Alcatel and Siemens are expected to be contracted to build digital exchanges worth $150m of that sum; Slovakia is hoping to get $230m of the $500m from the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development, and the European Investment Bank; Alcatel already has a joint venture with local company Tesla AS to build exchanges, and Siemens will assemble EWSDs at Tescom Praha, a joint venture with Czech-based Tesla Karlin AS; the waiting list for phones is 160,000.