Etisalat and Orascom lose outbid for AmenTel
ITP Technology, United Arab Emirates
July 31, 2006
by Alex Ritman
Etisalat has lost the bidding for Armenian fixed and mobile operator
ArmenTel. According to the Russian news agency ComNews, the 90% stake
currently held by Greek telco OTE will go to a consortium consisting of
India’s VTEL holdings and Knightsbridge Associates, and also believed
to include Sistema Group of Russia. The Russian company is thought
to be taking control of ArmenTel’s monopoly fixed-line business with
the Indian and Armenian side of the consortium taking responsibility
for its mobile operations.
Following OTE’s announcement that it was to sell its 90% stake in
April, 10 parties announced their interest, including Etisalat,
Sistema, MTC of Kuwait and Belgium’s Belgacom. In June, OTE reduced
the number of bidders to four, namely Vimpelcom and MTS of Russia,
an Etisalat-backed consortium, and the winning group.
While the amount of the winning bid is as yet unknown, the 90% stake
is estimated to be worth over US$300 million.
As of April 2006, ArmanTel had a fixed-line subscriber base of around
595,000 subscribers and a mobile subscriber base of around 320,000.
Egyptian operator Orascom has also missed an expansion opportunity,
losing out in the auction for Serbian mobile operator Mobi 63 in the
Balkan country’s largest state-owned asset sale. Mobi 63, which has
over two million subscribers, eventually went to Norway’s Telenor
for US$1.9 billion. Telekom Austria was also involved in the auction.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
