In a ceremony held at the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) this afternoon, the Saudi telecom regulator officially handed possession of the kingdom’s two MVNO licences to Virgin Mobile Middle East and Africa (VMMEA), and to Jawraa Lebara. A third licence, which had initially been won by Axiom Telecom and subsequently suspended, was not awarded.

People familiar with the situation suggest that the third licence will now be re-tendered in a process set to take place later in the year, and is only likely to be awarded late this year or early next depending on how long the CITC takes to undertake its review of the process. This would place the winning MVNO as well as its network operator partner – Zain Saudi Arabia – at a distinct disadvantage to the other two MVNOs, which are both preparing to launch commercial services as early as June.

VMMEA’s network partner is STC, while Jawraa Lebara’s is Mobily.

Telefonica is establishing its own mobile advertising exchange as a joint venture with Blackstone’s GSO Capital Partners (GSO).

The new ad agency, Axonix will be powered by technology acquired by Telefónica and Blackstone’s GSO Capital that underpinned the programmatic advertising platform, MobClix.

Simon Birkenhead has been appointed CEO of Axonix, leaving his current role as Telefónica’s director of Global Advertising Sales. The newly formed company will have a completely new executive management team and will operate globally with its headquarters in London.

Axonix will initially offer a self-service, mobile ad exchange platform to advertisers and publishers globally but with a specific focus on US and Europe, plus Latin America where Telefonica has local scale. Over 100 demand partners are already integrated into the Axonix platform.

Telefonica added that the use of its audience data, anonymised and aggregated, through a programmatic trading platform will enable Axonix to deliver improved ad relevancy and performance.

Zain Saudi Arabia reported a shrinking of its quarterly losses as the company improved its operating margins.

The operator reported narrowing its net loss for the period by 20 per cent year-on-year, to reach SAR318 million (US$85 million) at the end of the first quarter 2014, representing a 31 per cent fall in net loss quarter-on-quarter.

The company also succeeded in increasing its EBTIDA margin to 19 per cent up from 12 per cent during the same quarter in the previous year.

Zain Saudi Arabia reported a 68 per cent surge in data revenues during the first quarter year-on-year, and a 23 per cent increase as compared to the fourth quarter of the previous year.

Vodafone Qatar today announced new appointments to the company’s management team.

Mahmud Awad has been appointed as chief business officer and Ramy Reyad as chief technology officer.

Mahmud Awad (right) has been appointed Vodafone Qatar’s chief business officer

Ramy Reyad (left) is Vodafone Qatar’s incoming chief technology officer

With 18 years of telecom experience, Awad joins Vodafone Qatar from UAE telco Du where he was the VP of corporate sales leading a sales team of 100 professionals. During his time at Du, Awad created new revenue streams, introduced more industry specific solutions and established an end-to-end solution sales approach. Awad has also held executive roles with Neoris, Al Wataniya Telecom and Nokia Solutions & Networks.

Reyad has over 15 years of experience in telecom and joins Vodafone Qatar from Mobilink. As Mobilink’s CTO he successfully transformed the Mobilink technical department to optimise cost and investment. He also directed critical technical projects and oversaw the rollout of new capacity projects. Reyad will lead Vodafone into its next phase including LTE 4G launch and ensuring Vodafone’s infrastructure supports Qatar’s knowledge based economy.

The Communications and Information Technology Commission of Saudi Arabia (CITC), is to issue a fresh tender for the country’s third MVNO licence after apparently cancelling the one granted to Axiom Telecom last year.

Axiom Telecom had a provisional licence to offer services over the Zain network, but in the middle of March this year when Virgin Mobile Middle East & Africa (VMMEA) and Jawraa Lebara were formally granted their licences, no such award was made to Axiom Telecom.

Axiom is reported to have said that it had been unable to submit a specific document in time before the regulator cancelled its licence, but would be bidding again in the new tender process.

VMMEA and Jawraa Lebara are looking to launch services in the coming couple of months, with VMMEA utilising capacity from Saudi Telecom, and Jawraa Lebara from Mobily.

Comm. previously reported that Axiom Telecom had not been officially granted its licence in March due to the consortium having faced issues with its shareholder structure.