Huawei announced the appointment of Charles Yang as president of the Middle East region, replacing Shi Yaohong.

Yang joined Huawei in 1999 and has over 16 years of experience in the telecom industry playing a key role in many of Huawei’s milestone global projects. In this time he held a number of senior positions in the company, most notably as president of Huawei’s STC Group account and CEO for Huawei in Shandong, Neimeng, and Liaoning province in China.

Over the last three years, Yang has been active in Saudi Arabia, supporting the development of the telecom industry in the kingdom.

Alcatel-Lucent’s outgoing chief executive, Michel Combes, is reportedly set to join Europe’s communications group Altice, once the sale of the French vendor to Nokia is completed.

According to Challenges magazine, Combes, who announced his resignation as an independent non-executive director at Altice last week, will be brought in to lead the company’s telecom development in Europe.

The company beefed up its European telecom operations over the past year by acquiring Portugal Telecom’s Portuguese assets from Brazil’s Oi, and taking control of French mobile player SFR from Vivendi.

Alcatel-Lucent confirmed that Combes will be stepping down as a result of the Nokia deal but did not announce his next engagement, or departure date. He said in April he would not be taking a role at the combined Nokia-AlcaLu entity, once the €15.6 billion (US$16.6 billion) deal is completed.

Combes joined Alcatel-Lucent in 2013 in a bid to turnaround the troubled vendor’s fortunes following a tumultuous period under predecessor Ben Verwaayen.

Combes has been integral to the company’s sale to Nokia. The revival he inspired is seen as the reason why Nokia decided to take over the whole company, not just its mobile business, thus securing the vendor’s long-term position.

Combes joined Alcatel-Lucent after spending four years as CEO of Vodafone Europe, at a time when he was also courted by SFR, then owned by Vivendi, who named him as the company’s new chief executive in 2012, before the appointment broke down due to a management shakeup.

Altice, owned by billionaire Patrick Drahi, will look to Combes’ European telecom experience to integrate its newly acquired businesses.

Altice is also expanding into the US cable market. It recently announced the acquisition of US regional cable operator Suddenlink Communications for US$9.1 billion, after dropping interests in Time Warner Cable.

Eyes have been raised over mobile operator MTN Zambia’s decision to list its shares on the Lusaka Stock Exchange using a special purpose vehicle called Ikulileni Investments Plc.

Prospective shareholders have raised concerns that allowing MTN to list through Ikulileni will be a breach of listing rules that stipulate a company needs a minimum of three years profitability history.

Ikulileni Investments Plc was only incorporated in October 2014 and, under the rules of listing on the Lusaka Stock Exchange, the company does not qualify.

There is also concern over potential conflict of interest because some MTN Zambia directors, including board chairman Valentine Chitalu, are also shareholders in and board members of Ikulileni.

Some commentators have suggested MTN is attempting to avoid scrutiny by minority shareholders who will invest in the operator if it lists directly as MTN Zambia.

Zambia’s minister of Communications and Transport, Yamfwa Mukanga, has said as far as he was concerned, there was nothing irregular about the share offer.

Mobily issued a statement earlier today confirming it had postponed its annual shareholder meeting, scheduled for this afternoon, after Saudi Arabia’s Capital Market Authority (CMA) suspended trading of its shares on the country’s stock exchange yesterday.

The CMA has been conducting an investigation into the company’s financials, and in a statement, the financial regulator said it will not resume trading until the operator “discloses the financial impact on its financial statements, in light of observations that have been submitted to the company”.

The watchdog said its observations looked into Mobily’s financial statements, obtained documents and added that it had interviewed “concerned parties” before submitting the report to the company. It is not clear whether the regulator is looking for a response based on past or future earnings.

Mobily said it was looking into the matter, and will announce a date for the annual shareholder meeting in due course.

The company, owned by Etisalat, has been under investigation by the CMA since November 2014, after the operator restated figures for 2013 and the first nine months of 2014, which it blamed on an accounting error.

The issue led to the suspension, and the subsequent release of founding Mobily CEO Khalid Al Kaf, earlier this year.

Mobily then revised its 2014 financial performance, which saw it turn a small profit into a US$243 million loss.

The issue led to the regulator briefly suspending its shares in February in order to ‘give the company time to announce a clarification related to one of its businesses’. At the time, the CMA said it would “look into continuing the suspension” after Mobily disclosed the reasons behind the loss. The regulator stated its original investigation was based on the violation of market listing rules, including provisions against insider trading.

Etisalat Group has announced the sale of its 85 per cent stake in Zanzibar Telecom Limited (Zantel) to Millicom. Under the terms of the agreement, Etisalat will receive cash consideration of US$1 and Millicom will assume total debt obligations of US$74 million. In addition, Zantel will have up to US$32 million in net current liabilities at closing.

The transaction remains subject to regulatory approval by the Tanzanian Communication Regulatory Authority and the Fair Competition Commission.

Last September it was reported that Etisalat was considering the sale of its operations in Tanzania, with sources at the time suggesting that it was exploring the sale of its stake with the help of Deutsche Bank.

Zantel is a relatively minor player in Tanzania, but Millicom, which owns Tigo Tanzania, could benefit from the acquisition.

The remaining 15 per cent stake in Zantel is owned by the government of Zanzibar.