The Delhi High Court has restrained BSNL from awarding the contract for its GSM network expansion till November 16, 2006. This is in response to the petition by Motorola after it was disqualified from participating in the bidding. BSNL has stated that Motorola's quote of 3.2 million lines was way behind the eligibility condition of supplying/commissioning 20 million GSM lines under the basic network subsystem component. However, there is speculation that ZTE and Motorola were eliminated on security grounds (ZTE is a Chinese company and Motorola does significant equipment sourcing from Huawei). Ericsson, at about $107 per line, was the lowest bidder for BSNL's 45.5 million GSM line tender. Nokia was second, at about $177 per line, while Siemens fell out of the race.
Ericsson is to supply 60 per cent of the 45.5 million lines while Nokia will supply the rest. The ITI-Alcatel combine, for which 18 million lines had been reserved, will receive a $1.92 billion order.