Umniah acquires 3G licence

Batelco Group announced that it is investing JD50 million (US$70.47 million) to obtain a 3G licence in Jordan, via Umniah, its 96 per cent-owned subsidiary.

Umniah has obtained a 3G licence pursuant to paying JD50 million to the Telecommunications Regulatory Commission (TRC) and will further invest towards infrastructure and network expenses related to the roll out during the next six months.

Umniah acquired 2.1 GHz of spectrum from the TRC, preparing it to move forward with the rollout of the 3.75G services to its growing customer base. Umniah currently serves more than 2.3 million customers in the kingdom, giving it a 31 per cent market share.

Scheduled to be launched nationwide between the second and third quarter of year 2012, Umniah’s 3.75G services will ensure fast and accurate transfer of data and will provide subscribers with instant multimedia services (MMS). Service deployment will take place via an Evolved High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA+) infrastructure. Umniah’s network is already 3G ready with more than 1500 sites prepared to deploy 3G services.

The cellco becomes the third in Jordan to launch 3G, after Orange Jordan and Zain.