Staying at the top is hard

As a strategy-led publication, we are often asked to forecast what we believe to be the trends that will dominate the telecoms space in the coming years. It’s a hard question to answer, not least because technology develops at such a pace, but also because experience has shown certain developments that had been predicted to become sure fire successes, failed while others that the industry may not necessarily have intentionally fostered, have gone on to become significant winners.

What is clear in all this is that the maintenance of a close relationship with the end user will be the basis for sustainable success. And with a number of high profile network launches set to take place in the region in the coming quarters – Vodafone in Qatar, Zain in Saudi Arabia, Saudi Telecom in Kuwait, Etisalat in Nigeria – the real test of which operators are interpreting their market’s needs most effectively and cashing in on that shall be put to the test.

The issue of leadership and inspiration, as in every industry, will also be a large determining factor in the case of which telecoms organisations rise to the top and which fall by the way side, and in this month’s Comm., our focus on the people at the top is a recurring one.

Our cover story is based on an exclusive interview with Grahame Maher, the incoming CEO of the nascent mobile operator in Qatar, Vodafone Qatar. With plans to launch the network by March next year, and in the throws of preparing for an initial public offering scheduled to take place before the end of November, Maher details the strategic importance of entering the Qatar market for the Vodafone Group.

This is the fist greenfield operation the UK operator has launched in ten years, and with a minority stake in the post-IPO entity, Vodafone Qatar represents the evolution of Vodafone’s partnership model as it pursues greater participation in emerging markets across the globe.

There have been a number of high profile appointments and dismissals in telecoms around the world in the past few months, and Comm. took this opportunity to review what successful CEOs might be doing right, and the things that have led to their less fortunate peers facing the axe. The telecoms industry is a perilous one to be a captain of industry in, a state of play confirmed by a Booz & Co research report that identifies that telecoms had the highest attrition rate amongst CEOs of the world’s largest companies in 2007.

This month’s country profile on Oman is timely, given the rapid liberalisation process that is currently underway there. In June, five resellers were licensed at a nominal fee and are currently locked in negotiations with the country’s two mobile operators with the view to purchasing minutes wholesale, which the resellers can then repackage and sell to end-users.

Consensus opinion is that no more than three resellers are likely to be able to become viable operations in the country of three million, so the pressure is on the five licensees to pen agreements and come to market as quickly as possible. A fixed-line licence is also in the offering in Oman, with mobile operator Nawras believed to be a forerunner in that award, which if successful would finally give it authority to operate its own international gateway.

The reporting period for second quarter earnings offered Comm. the opportunity to assess the year-on-year performance of a number of leading regional service providers and multinational handset manufacturers, and makes for interesting reading.

At least two operators in the Middle East reported a decline in net profit year-on-year between the first half of 2007 and the first half of 2008, while revenue growth for many of the operators exceeded 25 per cent over the same period.

Tawanda Chihota, Group Editor