Kuwait court dismisses Zain lawsuit, clears deal hurdle
Kuwait’s commercial court has ruled that due diligence can proceed on Etisalat’s planned purchase of 46% of Kuwait-based telecoms firm Zain Group, denying a minority shareholder’s attempt to halt the transaction.
Al-Fawares Holding Company, which owns 4.5% of Zain, had sued the company and its second-largest shareholder, Al-Khair National, as well as National Investments Company, the firm charged with selling the stake, in early December to prevent Etisalat from gaining access to Zain’s data.
On 5 December Al-Fawares took out an advertisement in Kuwaiti daily Al-Watan indicating that it was going to demand that Zain be put into receivership unless the deal was made more transparent.
As per the advertisement, Al-Fawares confirms that continued violations … on the assets of the company and the rights of the board of directors … might push Al-Fawares or other shareholders to go to court and ask for the company to be placed into receivership unless things are done right, transparency is practiced and any attempts to sell Zain Saudi or any other asset of the company are halted.
It was anticipated that prolonged legal action could have badly delayed the transaction; Etisalat has stated that any deal could fail if definitive documents are not signed by 15 January 2011. Al-Fawares’s legal representative, Sheikh Khalifa Ali Al-Sabah, has confirmed that the shareholder plans further legal action ‘in the next couple of days’ with a view to derailing the transaction once more.
Zain Group of companies hold strategic commercial meeting at Dead Sea
Under the working theme of planning for a future by better serving its customers, the Zain Group held its annual strategic commercial workshop at the Kempinski Hotel on the Dead Sea from 20 to 21 December, 2010. Attended by senior marketing, branding and communications personnel from its seven operations across the Arab World, the meeting focused on the company’s future plans and strategic direction in all areas of customer care, new products and services, advertising and branding.
The workshop in Jordan follows several other important gatherings that Zain Group has held in the Kingdom, the most recent being the ACE and FUN meetings, in 2008 and 2009 respectively, that saw the attendance of over 500 senior managers from all of its operations across the Middle East and Africa.
Bashar Arafeh, Chief Commercial Officer of Zain Group said that, “holding such meetings in Jordan is testament to the importance the Group places on its telecommunication operation in the Kingdom and the advanced nature of the local industry, one that has been defined by HM King Abdullah’s vision of developing his country into a knowledge-based society and telecom hub.”
Mr Arafeh also added “the purpose of the gathering was to exchange ideas, plans and experiences between personnel from Group and the subsidiaries, in order to exploit future opportunities and to better prepare for common challenges in light of fierce competition in the regional telecommunications industry.”
The meeting also saw Zain Jordan CEO, Dr Abdul Malek Al Jaber, welcome the attendees by emphasizing Zain Jordan’s leading position and its future plans in terms of introducing new technologies in the local market. He also briefed the attendees on the local operation’s transformation from a simple mobile operator to an integrated telecommunications company, offering a complete range of mobile, data, fixed, and entertainment services.
Jordan has proven to be one of Zain Group’s most successful operations over recent years, showing remarkable growth in both revenue and net profit while maintaining a leading customer market share of 42%, despite competition from three other operators.
Q1 2010 – Zain revenue up 11% & subscribers up 28%.
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Total Managed Active Customers
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31.4 million up 28% on Q1, 2009
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Consolidated Revenues
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KWD 329.7 million (US$1.146 billion)
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EBITDA
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KWD 139.2 million (US$ 483.7 million)
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EBIT
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KWD 99.4 million (US$ 345.6 million)
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Net Income
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KWD 51.5 million (US$ 179.1 million)
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EPS
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KWD 0.013 (US$ 0.05)
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Zain Chief to visit Africa to follow up Bharti deal
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: To follow up on the transfer of the company’s African assets to Bharti Airtel Ltd, Assad al-Banwan, Zain Chairman will travel to Africa.
According to a local newspaper, the transfer of the African operations is almost complete. Indian telecommunications company Bharti Airtel and the Bahrain-based Zain group has signed definitive agreements for Bharti to buy most of Zain’s operations in Africa at an enterprise value of $10.7 billion.
Turkcell plans to buy stake in Kuwait’s Zain
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Turkey’s biggest mobile phone company, Turkcell has revealed the plans to buy stake in Kuwait’s largest mobile operator, Zain.
According to Turkcell chief executive Sureyya Ciliv, Zain is one of the companies our international development group is looking at, but at the moment there is no important development and the company is looking at the numbers and doing preliminary work on whether it’s suitable for Turkcell.
A Bahraini investment bank may manage a Zain transaction for Turkcell and it is expected to offer 1.5 dinars ($5.20) a share for the Zain stake. As per another report published in a newspaper, the major shareholders in Zain group have received verbal offers from four parties for the possibility to enter negotiations to buy a majority stake in the company.
Tamin becomes third telecom operator of Iran
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: License to the third mobile operator of the country, state-owned Tamin Telecom, has been granted by Iranian government. Tamin Telecom along with its consortium got the license in April 24. Availability of the SIM cards is expected in the market in the course of the current year.
Other winning companies of the consortium have still not been revealed. Consortium of Tamin and Etisalat were initially granted the license in January 2009 but was later withdrawn. Zain group received the license in May but that deal fell apart when it was said by Iran that Zain had not fulfilled its obligations, and launched a new tender.
Irancell, 49% stake of which is owned by MTN and state-owned Iran Telecommunication Company (TCI) are the current telecom operators in Iran.
Zain looses KWD 195m in 2009 (Middle East)
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Annual net profit of KWD 195 million in 2009 down from KWD 322 million in the previous year has been posted by Africa and Middle East mobile operator Zain Group. However, it has come down from KWD 322 million in the previous year.
According to Zain chairman Assad al-Banwan, the biggest challenge was strong currency fluctuations, which cost Zain around KWD 38 million last year. 24 percent rise in EBITDA has been noticed which closed at KWD 926 million.
A cash dividend of KWD 0.170 per share has been proposed by the company’s board excluding any distribution from the sale of some of Zain’s African assets to Bharti Airtel. A profit of USD 3.3 billion from the sale of its African assets after settling debt and provisions has also been expected by Zain.
Zain’s second-quarter financial statement might reflect this gain in the profit.
Zain’s money transfer service reaches West Africa
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: After a huge success of the concept of mobile money transfer in East Africa and particularly Kenya, Zain has announced to expand its mobile commerce service Zap to Niger, Sierra Leone and a full commercial pilot project in Malawi.
With this move, six African markets would be covered by the service with a combined population of 150 million people. The concept launched in February last year would complement the financial services sector in the continent as the mobile phone users will be able to send and receive money, pay for services as well as interact with their bank accounts using the service.
According Saad Al Barrak, Zain Group chief executive, the expansion of the service is an important step in pushing the boundaries of mobile communications and with the kind of impact the Zap had in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda, similar impact is hoped by Zain in Malawi, Niger and Sierra Leone, where formal banking services are largely restricted to urban hubs.
Zain has entered into a partnership with the National Bank of Malawi (NBM) and NBS Banks in Malawi, EcoBank in Niger and Zenith Bank in Sierra Leone besides working with Citibank and Standard Chartered in East Africa.
Zain to launch Wireless Mifi in Kuwait
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The Middle East and Africa operator Zain Group will soon launch Mobile Wi-Fi hotspot device, ‘Zain Mifi Intelligent Mobile Hotspot’ in Kuwait. The company will extend its services to the other countries later on.
This project will enable all the Zain customers to create their own Wi-Fi using their broadband connection. Apart from this, the connection can be also be shared with five Wi-Fi enables devices including laptops, smart phones, cameras, MIDS’s, UMPCs gaming devices or portable media players.
Zain customers can use this service in any of the other 20 Zain ‘One Network’ countries. The Mifi would not require any kind of installation or previously installed software and will be delivered by Novatel Wireless.
Celtel Nigeria and Nokia ink expansion deal (Nigeria)
Cellco Celtel Nigeria, owned by Kuwait’s Zain Group, and European vendor Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) have signed a USD130 million deal for network expansion nationwide. The project will see NSN installing 4,000km of fibre-optic backbone and microwave transmission equipment enabling Celtel to offer next-generation IP-based services.Celtel, formerly Econet, Vee Networks and V-Mobile, ended June 2007 with just under eight million subscribers, placing it third in the market with a 25% share.
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