PRESS: COMSTAR UTS GETS LICENSE FOR LD SERVICES IN ARMENIA
Prime-Tass English-language Business Newswire
March 31, 2008 Monday 12:28 PM EET
Armenia’s services regulator has licensed Russian telecommunications
company Comstar UTS to provide long-distance services, the company
said, business daily Kommersant reported Monday.
Armenian provider Kornet-AM, indirectly fully-owned by Comstar UTS,
plans to start offering the services sometime in June-August, using
a WiMAX wireless network, said Boris Demirkhanyan, chief executive
of Kornet-AM, Kommersant reported.
Kornet-AM is an Internet provider and also builds corporate networks.
Its revenue was U.S. $5 million in 2007, according to investment firm
Finam, the daily said.
The company plans to become a national telecommunications operator
by 2012 and become Armenia’s biggest Internet provider and its second
biggest telephone company after ArmenTel, a 100% subsidiary of Russian
mobile operator VimpelCom, Demirkhanyan said.
ArmenTel was a monopoly on the local telephone, long-distance and
Internet access markets until November 1, 2007.
The value of Armenia’s telecommunications market was $280 million
last year, according to Finam.