The year 2011 is shaping up to be one of co-operation, with two Malaysian operators this week announcing a network sharing deal while DoCoMo, China Mobile and KT forged a mobile alliance.
Mobile operators Celcom Axiata and DiGi have signed an agreement to share sites, microwave links and trunk fiber transmission.
The companies said they eventually plan to consolidate their networks, with a goal to fully combine over 4,000 sites by 2015.
They hope to achieve cost savings of 2.2 billion ringgit ($720.7 million) over 10 years, and combined average annual savings of up to 250 million ringgit after 2015.
The decision to share assets was made to help cope with Malaysia's surging data capacity requirements, according to Celcom CEO Dato' Sri Shazalli Ramly.
Celcom is Malaysia's second largest operator with around 29% market share as of December, while DiGi is biting at its heels with about 25%.
Celcom parent Axiata and DiGi owner Telenor formed a similar network sharing alliance in Bangladesh in June 2010.
NTT DoCoMo has meanwhile revealed it has entered into a wide-ranging business tie-up with China Mobile and Korea Telecom.
The alliance will concentrate on international roaming, enterprises services and networking technologies such as LTE, as well as smartphones and common platforms.
In a statement, DoCoMo said it had entered the collaboration in the spirit of a wave of international collaboration which is sweeping Northeast Asia.
DoCoMo and KT already have a roaming deal in place.