Indonesia gets its tenth mobile operator

Well, we'll find out in the coming months as Sinar Mas Telecommunications, controlled by billionaire Eka Tjipta Widjaja, becomes the country's 10th competitive mobile phone operator. It will operate under the brand name of "Smart Telecom". Interestingly the new mobile carrier will be an arm of Indonesia's biggest  producer and refiner of palm oil.

In its initial phase, Smart Telecom will be a 1.4 million subscriber capacity network – small in comparison to some other Indonesian networks. It will launch in Jakarta next month and plans to sign up 700,000 customers by year end.

Sinar Mas joins other small operators such as Bakrie Telecom and Mobile-8 Telecom that have entered the market to compete against Indonesia's big two mobile providers, Telkomsel and Indosat.