A total of 11 groups met the UK Department of Trade & Industry deadline of last Friday to bid for the two to four public cordless phone Telepoint licences. Latecomers included British Telecommunications Plc with Nynex Corp, STC Plc, and an unnamed European organisation, Telepoint Retailers Consortium and Telecommunications Corp. 50% of the newly-formed Retailers Consortium will be held by two individuals, Daniel Nebarro, with radio paging interests, and, Martin Dawes, in cellular retailing, weeeethe rest to go to other mobile commmunication parties. Shareholders will take responsibility for region, and the plan is to promote rapid capital growth and roll-out of the service. The Telecommunications Corp has four main shareholders, Michael Davis, chairman of the Cable Corp, Korda Ltd, Digital Mobile Communications Ltd and Swedtel Ltd. Additional shareholdings have already been bought by Standard Life Assurance and Drayton Consolidated Trust and the tender is based on broadband technology. The eight other applicants are Motorola UK with Shaye Communications Ltd; GEC Plc with Thorn EMI Plc, Plessey Co with Kingston Telecommunications, Hull; Ferranti Creditphone Ltd; Mercury Communications Ltd; Racal Telecommunications Plc; and Philips Telecommunications & Data Systems Ltd, the last four each bidding without a partner. The British Telecom-led consortium proposes to use Telecom’s Phonepoint system developed with STC, and its spread of partners is intended to speed penetration of the European and US markets where interest has been expressed in the nascent technology. France Telecom plans to implement a public cordless CT2 pilot next year and the Deutsche Bundespost said that it is interested in implementing any CCITT version that may emerge.
