For $800m Optus Communications Pty Ltd – in which Cable & Wireless and BellSouth each has a 24.5% stake with Optus Pty holding the remaining 51% – has won the tender to acquire loss-making Aussat, the Australian government’s satellite company, and to set up a new telecoms network to compete with Australia’s Telecom/OTC. Optus Communications has committed to spend $2,000m in capital expenditure over the next six years to implement both its network and services: by the second quarter of next year a mobile cellular service will be marketed in every state capital city. At the end of next year Optus plans to provide domestic long distance and internaitonal services for 45% of the population. In the early part of 1993 new digital cellular services for mobile and personal communications will be introduced based on the European Global System for Mobile Communication.
