Saudi led consortium pre-qualified by CITC for Kingdom's data services

Published April 28th, 2004 - 03:00 GMT

The World's Most Powerful Network (WMPN) consortium, led by i4 Communications together with Saudi based Al-Mozoon Group and International Systems Engineering (ISE), has been pre-qualified by the Saudi Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) for one of the two new licenses to operate data services in Saudi Arabia.

Subject to being awarded a licence in the Kingdom, the consortium plans to deploy WMPN, a new telecom infrastructure that will support next-generation high speed IP broadband services across the Middle East and beyond, using sub-sea cable links to Europe and eventually Asia.

Over the past two years more than 200 engineers from Europe and the US have participated in the network design with a large financial investment to date in preparing the WMPN for implementation.

WMPN plans to appoint a telecommunications prime contractor of international prominence to build and operate the network if awarded one of the two data licenses in Saudi Arabia. Designed jointly by ThruPoint, Cisco Systems, Corning, and i4 Communications, the network will initially be deployed in Saudi Arabia before expanding across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region's deregulating telecom markets when licensed to provide telecommunication services.

WMPN has retained the services of Gulf International Bank as its lead financial advisor, and the law firm Baker Botts as legal advisors, which operates in Saudi Arabia in association with the Law Office of Mohanned Bin Saud Al-Rasheed. — (menareport.com)