Telecoms roundup: Kölbi, ICE, Personal, GTT, Digicel

Costa Rican state-owned telco ICE has raised the prepaid voice rate per minute offered by its mobile subsidiary Kölbi.

The new price is 40 colons (US$0.074), a 17.6% hike over the previous price of 34 colons, according to local newspaper El Mundo.

Kölbi's new rate now reflects the maximum price permitted by the country's telecoms regulator Sutel.

Now Kölbi and Telefónica's Movistar charge 40 colons, while Claro (América Móvil) continues to charge 34 colons.

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Mobile operator Personal Paraguay has counted more than 120,000 active users on its LTE network, which was expanded in March.

The figure is equivalent to about 4.8% of its base of 2.5mn users, Juan Carlos Pepe, Personal's general manager was reported as saying by local daily La Nación.

The company has equaled the investment of US$100mn made ​​by Claro and Tigo (Millicom) in this technology and expects to reach 90% of the population by 2017.

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Guyana Telephone and Telegraph (GTT) and Digicel have announced their readiness to open 4G networks after receiving spectrum allocations from local authorities.

GTT has already received regulatory approval to begin marketing the service, while Digicel has completed its work and expects government approval to emulate its rival, according to a report by local news outlet Demerara Waves.

GTT said the service would initially be available to mobile customers in Georgetown, with additional areas being activated soon thereafter.