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Wireless Federation » archive for 'Qtel'

Qtel gifts low tariffs to its subscribers for the holy month of Ramzan (Qatar)

  • September 2nd, 2008
  • 5:40 am

Ramzan begins, another occasion for mobile operators to lure their customers. For the holy month of Ramzan, Qatar Telecom has sliced rates for local voice and video calls by 50 percent from 9pm till 6am every day of the sacred month. This offer is applicable to all mobile postpaid, Hala Prepaid and landline customers. On top of it, Qtel is providing its customers a range of special services and initiatives for Ramzan. The company has already extended its ‘Prayer Timing Alert’ service, which sends subscribers an automatic reminder of the specific prayer timing for each day. Throughout Ramzan, Qtel is making use of its multimedia services to provide subscribers with religious content.

Qtel plans rapid expansion, continues a buying spree (Qatar)

  • August 26th, 2008
  • 7:29 am

Qtel has planned to continue a buying spree to reach its set goal of being one of the world’s top 20 telecoms firms by market capitalisation by 2020.

“I think we’re going at the right pace,” said, Qtel Chairman Sheikh Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Saud al-Thani.
“It’s well-studied, well-measured. Just look at our record and we’ll keep going at the same speed,” he said.

According to Sheikh Abdullah, the firm will not engage in self important expansion rather than buying stakes in companies in its core areas.

Qtel recently acquired a stake in Kuwait’s National Mobile Telecommunications Co.

   

Qtel brings Unlimited Live TV for it’s 3G subscribers (Qatar)

  • August 18th, 2008
  • 6:11 am

Qtel, Qatar, gave it’s 3G subscribers a new surprise by launching an offer called Unlimited Live TV. This offers an unlimited access to mobile TV broadcasts for 24 hours for fee of QAR5 (USD1.37).
The Mozaic 3G Live TV service now has four of Qatar’s most popular channels - Al Jazeera, Cartoon Network, Al Jazeera and Al Kaas.

   

Qtel permitted to acquire 49% stake in Indosat (Qatar, Japan)

  • July 28th, 2008
  • 1:38 pm

Qatar Telecom (Qtel) will be permitted to acquire no more than 49% stake in Indosat, confirms Indonesia’s Capital Market and Financial Institution Supervisory Board.

The Middle Eastern investor already owns 40.8% of the company, meaning that it may buy no more than an additional 8.2% stake.

   

Five apply for fixed line licence (Qatar)

  • December 18th, 2007
  • 3:07 pm

Qatar’s telecoms regulator ictQATAR yesterday launched an auction for the country’s second fixed line network operating licence. ictQATAR published details of the application process on its website, with the licence expected to be awarded in April 2008. Five expressions of interest have already been received from the following parties: Argos Consortium (including US-based Verizon Communications), Bahrain Telecoms Company (Batelco), the UAE’s Emirates Telecommunications Corporation (Etisalat), Italian alternative telco Eutelia and QIPCO Consortium (including PCCW-HKT of Hong Kong). The concession will be awarded through a ‘beauty contest’ procedure, involving comparative evaluation of the potential operators, with ictQATAR assessing the technical merits of the bids based on the quality of the network and the range of services proposed by applicants. The regulator also published the terms of the licence together with responses to an earlier consultation paper on the draft permit. The licence will cost a fixed fee of QAR10 million (USD2.75 million), and will allow facilities-based domestic and international services, including authorisation to operate an international gateway. Additional parties may still register their interest until 7 February 2008.

Commenting on the launch of the auction, Dr Hessa Al Jaber, Secretary General of ictQATAR, said ‘Our goal is to bring to the residents and businesses of Qatar a state of the art network combining the latest technologies and services. We believe this is a very attractive market - with an expanding population, multiple new residential and business developments and one of the highest per capita incomes in the world.’ Last week the Vodafone & Qatar Foundation Consortium won Qatar’s second mobile network operating licence. Dr Hessa Al Jaber said that ‘Competition for this mobile licence from the international community was great and we expect a vigorous competition for the fixed licence as well.’ Both fixed and mobile licensees will compete with incumbent provider Qatar Telecom (Qtel).

   

Qtel to launch GSM service in Palestine in 2008 (Qatar)

  • November 22nd, 2007
  • 2:44 pm

Qatar mobile operator Qtel is preparing to launch GSM services in Palestine early in 2008, reports ArabianBusiness.com. The company’s CEO, Naser Marafih said in an interview that they are in the final stages of preparing to launch our services in Palestine. It has started preparing the ground for the launch and are just waiting for the final approval for the documentation. Qtel will initially focus on GSM services in the West Bank before looking at Gaza. It will compete with Paltel, the incumbent operator in Palestine. The company is optimistic about the move, not least because of a low mobile penetration rate in Palestine. The development forms part of Qtel’s strategy to expand its services, particularly its GSM offering, across the MENA region and parts of Asia.

   

Nawras 3.5G pilot announced (Oman)

  • November 6th, 2007
  • 2:56 pm

Oman’s second mobile operator Nawras, majority-owned by Qatar Telecom (Qtel), is to
‘soft-launch’ 3.5G HSDPA services in Oman ‘imminently’, reports the Times of Oman. The free trial will involve employees and customers living between the Muscat districts of Qurum and Al Athaiba and will last two months, after which a commercial service is set to be launched across Muscat and in the Port of Sohar. Nawras CEO Ross Cormack said, ‘Nawras is continuing to change the telecommunications landscape in Oman and will be the first mobile operator in the Sultanate to offer customers services based on the 3.5G technology. The new services will be supported by the reliable Nawras network and we are looking forward to offering both consumers and business customers the most innovative services and the latest technology offered anywhere in the world.’Nawras ended the first half of 2007 with 787,000 subscribers, giving it a 38% market share. The remainder was taken by incumbent Oman Mobile.

   

 
 

Etisalat interested in Omantel (Oman)

  • October 22nd, 2007
  • 7:00 am

UAE incumbent Etisalat has said it would like to buy into and run state-controlled Oman Telecommunications (Omantel), which is preparing to court a long-term investor. Omantel’s stock surged 10% on the news, the first public expression of interest in the telco since Oman’s government said earlier this month that it would sell a stake in the company to make it more competitive. ‘Oman is a growth market, and there are synergies for us in the Middle East,’ said Jamal al-Jarwan, chief executive of Etisalat International Investments, adding that he expected the sale to include a contract to manage Omantel, although he declined to be drawn on how much Etisalat would consider investing. The government owns 70% of Omantel and the rest is traded on the Omani exchange. It has not given any details about the sale process.

Etisalat, the third largest Arab telecom operator by market value, has spent more than USD6.5 billion on foreign acquisitions in the past three years resulting in a strong presence across the Middle East and Africa. Its largest investments outside the UAE are in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan. It is also known to be after mobile phone licences in Kuwait and Qatar, markets in which Omantel’s domestic rival, Qatar Telecommunications (Qtel) operates. In Oman, Qtel owns cellco Nawras.

   

 
 

Etisalat may bid for Kuwaiti telco (UAE)

  • August 24th, 2007
  • 8:38 am

UAE operator Etisalat said on Thursday it was interested in bidding for a stake in Kuwait’s third mobile phone operator to tap demand for telecoms in the Middle East’s fourth-largest oil producer.

Kuwait’s government has invited companies to express an interest in bidding for a 26% stake in the operator that it is setting up, by a September 7 deadline.
“We are very interested in bidding,” said Jamal Al-Jarwan, general manager of international business at state-owned Etisalat, the third-largest Arab telecom provider by market value.

“It makes a lot of a commercial sense for us to have operations in many countries, especially in the Middle East… Kuwait’s GDP per capita is high,” he said by telephone.

Etisalat chairman Mohammed Omran told Reuters last month the company was evaluating the Kuwaiti invitation, though had not make a decision about bidding.
Still, it is not clear the Kuwaiti government will allow foreign companies to compete for the stake, Jarwan said.

Kuwait’s Al-Seyassah newspaper said on Monday the Kuwaiti government had decided against allowing foreign firms to take part.

On Thursday, Kuwait’s Al-Wasat newspaper reported as many as 11 foreign and 14 local companies, including Saudi Telecom (STC) and Egypt’s Orascom Telecom, were considering competing for the stake.

Others include Oman Telecommunications (Omantel), National Bank of Kuwait and Kuwait Finance House (KFH), the newspaper reported, without saying how it got the information.

Kuwait’s Global Investment House, Bahrain’s operator Batelco and Commercial Bank of Kuwait (CBK) may also bid, the newspaper said.

A CBK official, who did not want to be identified, said the bank was preparing a bid in partnership with Noor Financial and a telecom operator he would not identify.

Kuwait’s government will sell 50% of the planned operator in an initial public offering, 26% to an operator and keep the rest.

Kuwait has two mobile phone networks, one run by Mobile Telecommunications (MTC) and the other by National Mobile Telecommunications (Wataniya), which is controlled by Qatar Telcommunications (Qtel).

Hatim Al-Gammal, head of investor relations at Orascom, and a spokesman of NBK declined to comment. A spokesman for Batelco could not immediately comment.

   

 

Qtel 2Q revenues more than double

  • August 7th, 2007
  • 2:58 pm

Qatar Telecommunications (Qtel), Qatar’s incumbent fixed line and mobile operator and third-largest firm by market value, made a second-quarter net profit of QAR486 million (USD134 million), up by QAR62 million year-on-year. Revenues were QAR2.56 billion in Q207, up from QAR1.08 billion in Q206, as the cost of domestic and international expansion rocketed.