MTS resumes operations in Turkmenistan
MOSCOW. Aug 30 (Interfax) - Russian 'big-three' telecoms operator Mobile TeleSystems (MTS) resumed communications services in Turkmenistan on Thursday, the company said in a press release.
MTS-Turkmenistan has launched voice call services, text, mobile Internet, international communications and international voice roaming. It plans to hook up its 3G network in the near future.
The MTS subsidiary connected over 600,000 users on the first day of its operations.
The company expects that it will have 440,000 subscribers in Turkmenistan by the end of this year. That would be 80% fewer than it had when it halted operations due to the suspension of its license in December of 2010 (2.4 million).
MTS has invested $1.5 million in recommencing its network operations in the country and plans to invest another roughly $40 million more in business development there before 2015.
Last month, MTS signed all the necessary papers for resuming its operations in the country. It had, prior to December 2010, been licensed to provide GSM and 3G services for a period of three years.
Under a five-year agreement reached between MTS and the state electronic communications company Turkmentelecom, MTS-Turkmenistan will be paying Turkmentelecom 30% of net profits made from in-country operations in line with Turkmenistan's accounting rules on a monthly basis.
With MTS-Turkmenistan providing communications services, former MTS representative in the republic BCTI will remain part of the MTS group.
MTS has been a presence in Turkmenistan since 2005 under a three-year agreement between wholly owned MTS subsidiary BCTI, MTS and the Turkmen Communications Ministry. Under this agreement, BCTI provided the ministry with 20% of net profits.
That agreement expired on December 21, 2010. The Turkmen authorities suspended BCTI's license for a month, but had until now not renewed it. MTS and BCTI filed a joint lawsuit against the Communications Ministry for international arbitration with the International Chamber of Commerce, and BCTI also filed suit against Turkmentelecom and Altyn Asyr, which had stopped working with the company per the earlier-concluded agreement. In preparations for MTS to resume operations in Turkmenistan, the parties withdrew their counter claims.