PETALING JAYA, July 29 — Telekom Malaysia Bhd (TM) said today it is going ahead its bidding process for the 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) despite being bogged down by a claim of industrial espionage.

The telecommunications giant’s chief executive Tan Sri Datuk Seri Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa confirmed that the utility would “just carry on” with the tender process and added that its domestic inquiry into the alleged espionage incident was nearing completion.

“As long as we’ve not made any announcements, then things will be on status quo, if there are changes, we will make the announcements at the appropriate time,” he told a news conference when asked about the status of the 4G LTE tender.

Asked about the status of TM’s internal probe into the alleged spying case, he replied: “That is still ongoing but we are almost done.”

TM had previously confirmed with The Malay Mail Online that it was investigating a complaint in which a worker with one of its multinational partners had allegedly joined a group of TM employees in visiting the overseas facility of a rival partner company of TM.

“TM was made aware by one of our long standing partners of an incident where allegedly an employee of another partner of TM gained unauthorised access to one of its facilities abroad.

“In this incident, the person was part of a group of current TM employees who were visiting the facility at that time, as part of a business trip in the ordinary course of TM’s operations,” TM had said in a statement to The Malay Mail Online on July 9.

The Malay Mail Online understands that the person involved worked for a multinational telecommunications equipment company based in a developing economy, and had allegedly gained unauthorised access to the facilities of another TM partner, a Europe-based equipment company.

The multinational’s employee was said to have got in as part of TM’s entourage during a business visit, prompting accusations from the European firm that TM was enabling its strongest rival to accomplish industrial espionage.

“In line with our zero tolerance policy on improper and irregular practices, we have already taken immediate action by suspending the TM employees involved, and a Board Sub-Committee (BSC) has also been formed to oversee the investigation process and outcome,” TM, Malaysia’s largest integrated telecommunications provider, had also said in the statement.

In its statement, TM did not name the two companies involved in the alleged incident, saying that it wanted to be fair to all parties in the tender process.

But The Malay Mail Online understands that both are rival companies bidding to provide infrastructure for TM’s 4G LTE plans.

It was previously reported that TM had invited several major industry players, including Huawei, Ericsson, Samsung and Alcatel-Lucent, to submit their tenders for the 4G LTE.

It is understood that a complaint has been lodged by the European firm to both TM and the Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), the regulator of the LTE rollout.

The MCMC has declined to comment on the issue. When contacted, some of the companies invited to bid for the 4G LTE have either declined to comment or have yet to respond to The Malay Mail Online’s queries.

The LTE is a next generation technology, also called ‘4G’, which promises mobile broadband speed up to 300 Mbps and would allow providers to offer high-definition video streaming and better connectivity.

TM was originally expected to finish its tender evaluation by the middle of September, and roll out commercial service by February 2013.

Unlike its competitors, pre-request for proposal (RFP) notes showed that TM is planning to utilise the 800MHz spectrum band, which will give better signal transmission with less base stations, thus making it more cost-effective.

TM’s competitors Maxis, Celcom and DiGi have deployed their LTE broadband using the 1.8GHz band, instead of the 2.6 GHz band officially awarded to them by MCMC in December last year.

MCMC had also awarded five other companies in the 2.6GHz band: tycoon Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary-owned Puncak Semangat Sdn Bhd, U Mobile Sdn Bhd, REDtone Marketing Sdn Bhd, YTL Communications Sdn Bhd, and Packet One Networks Sdn Bhd.