Business news for Thu, 20 Dec 2007 & with words million+phone. 2 news.

CHINA Mobile will purchase 30,000 3G phones based on a home-grown standard via a public bidding to begin tests on the third generation network, the world's biggest cell phone carrier said yesterday. But the move doesn't mean that home-grown TD-SCDMA phones and long-awaited services will be commercially used nationwide soon, analysts said. The telco will purchase 30,000 TD-SCDMA (time division-synchronous code division multiple access) phones and 10,000 TD-SCDMA data cards to test the pilot network. Interested firms have until Sunday to get the bid documents. Gao Songge, a China Mobile's spokesperson, declined to reveal the budget of the purchase and timetable. Each TD-SCDMA model costs about 2,500 yuan (US$338) to 3,000 yuan. China Mobile, which added an extra 6.5 million subscribers last month, invested heavily to build TD-SCDMA networks in several cities including Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen as a preparation for the Olympics next year. "TD-SCDMA needs more time

VIVENDI'S SA's SFR phone unit has offered to buy the rest of Neuf Cegetel for 4.5 billion euros (US$6.5 billion) to challenge France Telecom SA in the market for combined fixed-line, Internet and mobile services. SFR, which owns 40.5 percent of Neuf, will pay 34.50 euros a share for the 29.5 percent stake held by Louis Dreyfus & Cie, the commodities firm that helped found Neuf a decade ago, Bloomberg News reported. SFR will bid 36.50 euros for the remaining shares in the market. The prices include the 2007 dividend. The acquisition of Neuf Cegetel, France's second-largest fixed-line phone company, adds 3.1 million high-speed Internet customers for SFR and more than 3 billion euros in annual revenue. SFR, Vivendi's largest business, has about 34 percent of the French mobile market, compared with France Telecom's 45 percent. "This would create a more formidable competitor," Jerry Bellman, analyst at Kepler Equities in Paris, said. "For SFR this is a defensive move,