An Iranian official says a domestic consortium has been set up to get Iran's much-delayed third mobile phone network off the ground.

Ramezan Ali Sadeghzadeh, deputy head of Industrial Development and Renovation Organization of Iran (IDRO), said his organization reached an agreement with Iran's Tamin Telecom to make investment in the project.

Tamin Telecom, which is an affiliate of the Social Security Investment Company of Iran, confirmed in a statement that it secured the license for Iran's third mobile license after paying 300 million euros to the government.

Sadeghzadeh said the consortium — Tamin Telecom, IDRO and Imam Khomeini Decree Center — will roll out 3G services throughout Iran next year.

In July, Iran pulled its third mobile license from Kuwait's Mobile Telecommunications Co (Zain) after the company had not 'fulfilled its obligations'.

Zain had replaced the Emirati Telecommunications Corp., Etisalat, which had won the tender in January, after the UAE operator failed 'to give necessary guarantees and license fees on time'.

Zain, a consortium of two Iranian companies and Kuwait's Mobile Telecommunications Co., was the runner-up in the original bidding for the mobile license in December last year, which saw the concession awarded to Etisalat for $399 million.

The current telecom operators in Iran are the state-owned Iran Telecommunication Company (TCI) and Irancell, which is 49 percent owned by South Africa's MTN Group.

DB/SC/AKM