By Aled Herbert, 12 October 2000 09:30
NEWS While ecommerce minister Patricia Hewitt had predicted "widespread availability" by that time, the telecoms regulator warned that fewer than 1,000 of the 6,000 local exchanges will be ready for rival operators to use. According to the Daily Telegraph, Oftel has proposed a "special ballot" among telecoms companies to resolve the ongoing row about BT's laggard unbundling strategy. Meanwhile, the Financial Times quotes Oftel officials claiming the timetable for unbundling the local loop has become "like the Middle East peace process". You can watch an exclusive Agenda Setters interview with Dave Edmonds, director general of Oftel on the site now... http://www.silicon.com/a40199 Motorola has warned that demand for mobile handsets is slowing down, with the result that high-tech exchanges took another battering overnight. The mobile operator warned that sales of handsets would reach between 410 and 425 million this year, not the 425 to 450 million previously estimated. The warning wiped almost 19 per cent off the company's value, with rivals Ericsson and Nokia also feeling the pinch as each lost about 6 per cent off their market cap... And finally, the FT reports that Barclays bank and Japanese investment giant Nomura are jointly launching a shopping portal through Barclaycard. The credit card company currently has 300,000 customers using its online account services and hopes the project will boost the numbers to over half a million later this year...
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