| Type | limited liability company |
|---|---|
| Industry | mobile telecommunications |
| Founded | 2001 |
| Headquarters | Sofia, Bulgaria |
| Key people | Haris Kotsibos, CEO |
| Products | mobile telephony, fixed telephony, Internet services |
| Revenue | €423.3 million (2010) [1] |
| Employees | 1,300 (December, 2010) |
| Website | www.globul.bg |
GLOBUL (network code 284-05) is the second-largest Bulgarian GSM/UMTS operator.
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The company was founded in 2001 and is 100% owned by Greek telecommunications corporation Cosmote, which is active in four Balkan countries: Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, and Albania. Deutsche Telekom holds 30% of the Greek company. [2] The company is among the biggest green field investment in Bulgaria with over BGN 1.6 billion (some €800 million) invested by in the development of GLOBUL’s network and services.
GLOBUL's GSM network covers 99,98%% of Bulgaria’s population and 98,92% of the country’s territory. The company has roaming agreements with over 400 operators in more than 170 countries and territories worldwide.
In 2005, GLOBUL received a license for developing and implementing 3G UMTS mobile telecommunications network as well as a fixed telephony license.
GLOBUL launched 3G services on September 25, 2006. The company uses HSDPA (14,4 Mbit/s download speed [3]) and HSUPA (2 Mbit/s upload speed) technologies. As of end of March 2011, GLOBUL UMTS network covers 88% of the country's population.
GLOBUL changed the company logo in June 2006 to unify it with the Cosmote logo.
In 2006, GLOBUL launched i-mode in Bulgaria. GLOBUL is the first European operator to develop the platform infrastructure and launch i-mode in the record time of less than six months, while being one of the few to offer the service upon launch to all its customers, both contract and prepaid. GLOBUL was the first operator worldwide to introduce Nokia i-mode handsets in September 2007.
In 2007 GLOBUL launched BlackBerry (trade mark of RIM) - mobile solution for reliable and permanent on-line access to your office and personal e-mail addresses directly from the mobile phone. The service is accessible from the network of GLOBUL as well as from the roaming partners of GLOBUL.
On March 20, 2009, GLOBUL launched iPhone 3G in Bulgaria and four months later offered the new iPhone 3GS. In August 2010, GLOBUL offered iPhone 4.
The mobile operator was the first in Bulgaria to propose an integrated solution for fixed and mobile telephony with the MVPN service, Office Zone and Student Zone. These services allow users to have mobile and fixed-line number in one mobile handset and use both numbers in a user-defined physical area, as well as short numbers and a private numbering plan for the corporate customers. As of March 2011, GLOBUL has over 150,000 users of its fixed-line services.
In 2007 GLOBUL received a license for 802.16 point-to-multipoint network in the 26 GHz band. The company uses WiBAS technology for broadband wireless transmission in the major cities [4]
In 2009 GLOBUL started fast-speed broadband Internet services.[5] Thus, the operator service portfolio includes full range of consumer telecommunication services – mobile telephony, fixed telephony and broadband Internet services.
As of end of March 2011, GLOBUL has over 3.9 million subscribers, some 58% of them contract subscribers and 42% pre-paid users.
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