In a regular series, Mobile World Live‘s Asia Editor Joseph Waring provides a regional roundup of news snippets:

Singapore’s M1 moves to LTE-A
M1 has rolled out LTE-Advanced across 95 per cent of Singapore, giving customers peak (theoretical) download speeds of up to 300Mb/s.

The operator said it will charge existing and new customers the same rate for the faster service, but users will need devices that support the LTE-A standard. M1 currently offers four LTE-A compatible handsets from Samsung: the Note 4 4G+, Note Edge 4 4G+, Alpha 4G+ and S5 4G+.

The company said the typical download speed for the LTE-A service is 43 to 115Mb/s. For its existing 150Mp/s LTE network the typical download speed is 24.6-89.4Mb/s.

India’s DoT to consider extending spectrum deadline
India’s Department of Telecom (DoT) reportedly will today consider extending the use of spectrum by Bharti Airtel and Vodafone to avoid disruption in services in Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata.

The DoT only assigned the spectrum to the operators in late October, giving them little time to switch from the old frequencies, which expired at the end of November, to the new bands, which the operators won in an auction back in February.

Idea Cellular, which won 5MHz of 900MHz airwaves that were previously used by Vodafone and Airtel, has agreed to allow the two operators to use the new spectrum until 14 January, pending regulatory approval.

The Telecom Commission is also expected to make a decision on the reserve price for the February auction of the 800MHz, 900MHz and 1.6GHz bands.

Pegatron likely to be main iPhone 6S source
Taiwan’s contract manufacturer Pegatron is optimistic it will become the primary source of the next 4.7-inch iPhone model, since Apple aims to diversify its supply chain, the China Post reported.

A source told the Post that over the last few years, Apple has increased the number of suppliers to reduce risk and give it more bargaining power. The person expects Pegatron to supply more than 50 per cent of future iPhone 6S units. He said because iPhones are difficult to assemble, suppliers tend to lose money in the first one to two years until the yield rates increase.

Pegatron began assembling iPhones in 2012 and now turns out 30 per cent of the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 models. Foxconn assembles the other 70 per cent and all of the larger iPhone 6 Plus units.

TSMC chief sees strong growth ahead
Taiwan’s semiconductor leader TSMC aims to outpace the sector’s expected growth rate of 4-5 per cent next year, with strong demand for 40nm chips, which are likely to account for 20 per cent of its revenue in Q4.

TSMC co-chief executive officer said the company is expecting revenue to grow 27 per cent this year, the Taipei Times reported.

The company, the world’s larger contract chip manufacturer, supplies chips for the iPhone 6 series and has plans to start pilot production of advanced 10nm technology by the end of 2015.

India’s tablet market grows 10%
While the tablet market in most countries is slowing, Q3 shipments in India grew 10 per cent quarter-on-quarter to 940,000 units – the fastest growth this year.

Due to the popularity of phablets (5.5-6.99-inch screens), smaller-screen tablets have taken a hit, with stronger demand for larger models, which has helped boost the average selling price for the category, said Kiran Kumar, research manager of client devices at IDC India.

Samsung is the market leader with a 22 per cent share, followed by Micromax with almost an 11 per cent share.