Japan's KDDI and conglomerate Sumitomo are in talks to become the exclusive international partners of Myanmar state-owned operator MPT.
A Sumitomo official toldReuters that the companies are negotiating sharing MPT's existing telecom license to provide expanded services in the market.
MPT, currently Myanmar's sole mobile operator and its telecom regulator, is seeking international partners to help it prepare for the enhanced competition from Telenor, Ooredoo and domestic ISP Yatanarpon.
The government plans to allocate new telecom licenses to all three operators in a bid to stimulate the sector and improve Myanmar's tiny mobile penetration rate. As part of the reform process, a new regulator will be created by 2015, and the government plans to divest a minority stake in MPT.
KDDI and Sumitomo had jointly bid for one of the two licenses due to be allocated to foreign operators during last year's tender, and now have another bite at the apple.
Sumitomo, NTT Com and NEC also recently completed construction work for a contract with the Myanmar government to provide telecom equipment including a 30Gbps core optical backbone network and 50 LTE base stations.