Hong Kong's appeal court blocked plans by PCCW , a telecoms operator, to buy out its shareholders.

ECONOMIST: Business this week

Privatisation is another avenue being explored: the second national telecoms operator must have a black-owned partner that controls 19% of the new operation.

ECONOMIST: Black empowerment in South Africa

One complicating factor for First Pacific as a bidder for PAL is that Pangilinan is chairman of PLDT, the largest telecoms operator in the Philippines.

FORBES: Lucio Tan May Be Ready To Sell Loss-Making Philippines Airlines

Not so long ago, I was speaking with a European country-head of a major global telecoms network operator who was enthusiastically endorsing Huawei as a value-chain partner.

FORBES: Made in China: Smarter Companies?

VSNL, the government's international telecoms and internet operator, and two petroleum corporations.

ECONOMIST: India

When Japan's telecoms market was liberalised in the 1990s the former monopoly operator, NTT, was forced to compete.

ECONOMIST: Japanese manufacturing

Huawei, a telecoms company, already supplies handsets to Vodafone, the world's biggest mobile operator.

ECONOMIST: Good for China, but good for its neighbours too

Although the firm runs a successful telecoms business, Infostrada, as well as Omnitel, Italy's second cell-phone operator, Roberto Colaninno, the chief executive, and his team cannot claim credit for this.

ECONOMIST: Telecom Italia

Alternatively, rivals may hand over mail to the national operator for final delivery, akin to the last-mile connection that gives new entrants access to existing telecoms infrastructure.

ECONOMIST: Post offices