Qtel today announced that it had successfully reached the milestone of two million mobile customers in Qatar, having reported a surge in sales in July, driven by the popularity of its Hala service and the increasing interest in Shahry – Pay Monthly, the a post-paid service.

Qtel has experienced accelerating growth within the Qatari market in 2009, registering 1.8 million customers in March 2009. The official population of Qatar stood at 1.65 million, according to the Qatar Statistics Authority (QSA), translating to a penetration rate of 121 per cent.

The incumbent’s strong performance in the past six months has been linked to the entry of the second telecoms provider, Vodafone Qatar, which was set to launch its mobile services commercially earlier this year, but is now set to do so sometime in Q3.

France-based media and telecom conglomerate Vivendi has formally confirmed it is holding talks to buy a controlling stake in Zain’s African mobile phone businesses.

In a statement Vivendi confirmed its interest in acquiring a majority stake in the Zain group’s telecommunications activities in Africa, in line with its strategy of seeking growth opportunities in emerging countries. The company said this acquisition would enable Vivendi to capitalise on its experience of developing mobile telephony in Africa, but at this stage there is no certainty that the discussions currently in progress will lead to a successful outcome.

In any event, Vivendi said it will examine this investment according to its usual profitability criteria and will adhere strictly to its usual principles of financial discipline. Meanwhile, the Financial Times cited sources close to the negotiations that Vivendi made an informal offer to Zain, which valued the African assets at US$10 billion-US$11 billion. The sources claim that the French media and telecoms company was considering purchasing a majority stake in Zain’s African businesses of between 51 and 65 per cent. Zain has mobile operations in 15 African countries having acquired Celtel, for US$3.4 billion in 2005.

Friendi Group, which operates Omani MVNO Friendi Mobile, has launched a programme called Reach Out that is set to provide Friendi Mobile customers in Oman and those out of the country with competitive mobile international call rates.

The first phase of the Reach Out programme is the launch of a partnership between Friendi Group and Idea Cellular of India. Friendi Mobile customers in Oman are now able to call Idea subscribers in Kerala at rate as low as 139 Bz (US$0.36) per minute, the lowest international mobile call rate from any mobile provider in Oman to India. Idea subscribers in Kerala will also benefit from a reduced rate when calling Friendi Mobile customers in Oman, with all calls charged at only INR 9.19 (US$0.19) per minute.

“The Reach Out programme is a major strategic initiative for our group, and the partnerships with leading mobile operators globally are allowing us to offer our customers in the SAMEA region even better international call rates and innovative new services,” commented Mikkel Vinter, CEO of Friendi Group. Friendi Group will soon be launching similar partnerships in other countries including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Philippines as well as selected countries in Europe.

Friendi Mobile launched commercial operations in Oman on April 28 this year.

Much of the development of the UAE in recent years has been with respect to diversifying the economy and creating a knowledge society, which will ultimately export expertise to other parts of the world. BS Technologies is a local company that epitomises this shift in mindset, having identified communications technology as a growth opportunity in which it can not only participate, but actually lead the way. Bin Salem chief executive Ahmed Mohamed Al Dhaheri describes to Comm. his vision of the future his company is helping to construct

Al Dhaheri, CEO of Bin Salem believes technology will drive commerce in more profound ways in the future, hence his company’s interest in building competence in this area

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Wi-tribe was formed in April 2007, as a joint venture between Qtel and A.A. Turki Corporate Trading and Construction (ATCO), in addition to a technical partnership with US high-speed broadband company Clearwire. Wi-tribe’s aim has been to roll out WIMAX networks across markets in the Middle East, North Africa and South East Asia, and two years after its creation, Comm. goes in search of the progress the company has made to date

Philippe Berard reveals that Wi-tribe also has something in the Philippines where the operator is looking at a business case and is starting to put some plans in place for a roll out

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