Asia Pacific

Singaporean operator StarHub has picked Huawei to expand and upgrade its national HSPA mobile network with HSPA Evolved technology by second-quarter 2009. The upgrade aims to increase the operator’s current maximum mobile broadband speeds from 14.4 Mb/s to 21 Mb/s (downlink) and from 1.9 Mb/s to 11 Mb/s (uplink).

The Indian government has set state-owned mobile operator BSNL a target of achieving a 30 percent market share in the country within the next five years, according to a report by India's Hindu Business Line.

South Korean operator KT said its third-quarter net profit grew 80 percent, but operating profit dropped 12 percent from a year earlier on higher marketing expenses, reports the Wall Street Journal.

India's telecoms minister, Andimuthu Raja, has revealed he expects there to be further cuts in mobile termination rates (MTRs) in 2010, Dow Jones reports, notes TeleGeography.

China Mobile has launched a second round of tenders for mobile handsets and datacards based on China's proprietary TD-SCDMA 3G standard.

Hutchison is to offer Apple's iPhone in Hong Kong and Macau later this year, the Hong Kong-based company said in a statement this morning.

Microsoft has unveiled its Connected Services Accelerator programme at this week's GSMA Mobile Innovation Marketplace in Atlanta. The programme is a series of projects designed to commercialise new types of mobile services through collaboration with independent software vendors, developers and operators. Microsoft will team with mobile operator SingTel to launch the programme's first project.