Tele2 Russia

Tele2 Russia (Russian: Tele2 Россия) is a Russian telecommunications company founded in 2001 by the Swedish group Tele2, based on networks it acquired in Russia. It Provides cellular services more than 23 million subscribers in 41 subjects of the Russian Federation. Since April 2013 the company is no more related to the Swedish Tele2.

Functions as a group of companies, the full name of the parent structure of the holding - Limited Liability Company "T2 RTK Holding". The company's headquarters are located in Moscow.

History

Tele2 Russia headqurters in Moscow

During the first two years of operation in Russia (2003–2004 years) TELE2 start providing services in 12 regions: Saint-Petersburg, Udmurtia, Belgorod, Irkutsk, Kemerovo, Kursk, Leningrad, Nizhny Novgorod, Omsk, Rostov, Smolensk and Chelyabinsk regions.

In December 2004, Tele2 Sverige AB acquired the U.S. MCT Corporation and its partner LLC "Votek" 100% stake in mobile operator JSC Voronezh "Votek Mobile". "Votek Mobile" provides cellular telephony standard AMPS / DAMPS in the Voronezh region and had a GSM-1800 license to this region. In November 2005, Tele2 Sverige AB acquired the U.S. MCT Corporation and its partner LLC "Lipetsk Telephone Company '94% stake in mobile operator Lipetsk JSC" Lipetsk Mobile which provides cellular telephony standard AMPS / DAMPS in the Lipetsk region and had a GSM-1800 license to this region.

In July 2006, the MCT Corporation acquired 100% shares of Vostok Mobile North-West BV, which owns all of the shares of JSC "Arkhangelsk Mobile Networks" and JSC "Novgorod Telecommunications", as well as having a 75% stake in ZAO "Murmansk Mobile Network" and JSC "Parma Mobile" (Komi Republic). Furthermore, TELE2 acquired shares from minority shareholders of ZAO "Murmansk Mobile Network" and ZAO "Parma Mobile", reaching thus a 100% interest in these companies. The total subscriber base of the acquired companies accounted for more than 250 thousand subscribers. The cost of the deal - $35 million. On August 13, 2007 Tele2 Russia signed with "VimpelCom" national roaming agreement for 10 years. TELE2 simultaneously sold the company "VimpelCom" its operations in Irkutsk for 1.6 billion kronor. On October 5, 2007 the company announced the acquisition of a subsidiary of JSC "SMARTS" in Krasnodar territory LLC "Telecom Eurasia" for 24.5 million U.S. dollars [9 ] [10] . "Telecom Eurasia" was created on 2 June 1999. On October 1, 2007 has about 32 thousand subscribers in the region and a license to provide telecommunications services GSM-1800 . [11] October 18, 2007, a subsidiary of «TELE2 Russia ", JSC " Tele2- Kemerovo " contest was won (№ 8-RCH/2007 ) for licenses to provide cellular services GSM-1800 in Tomsk region. In subsequent competitions (№ 10,11,13,14), held in late 2007, subsidiaries Tele2 Russia won tenders for licenses to provide cellular GSM-1800 in the following regions : Evenki District, Krasnoyarsk Territory, Novosibirsk oblast, Republic of Karelia, Vologda Region, Pskov region, Nenets Autonomous District, Oryol Region, Ryazan region, Tambov region, Tver region, Tula region, Kirov region, Bryansk, Vladimir region, Kaluga region, Kostroma region. Thus, only in 2007 was obtained 18 licenses for 17 regions (one license for Udmurtia, where TELE2 already was). On April 23, 2008 the company announced the acquisition of TELE2 private individuals CJSC " Adygea cellular communication", the key asset is a license to provide cellular services GSM-1800 in the Republic of Adigya. The deal amounted to about U.S. $2 million. On November 27, 2008 TELE2 announced the acquisition of a cellular network in the Kaliningrad region, operating under the brand " Digital Expansion. On September 21, 2010 the company announced the provision of telecommunications services to its customers in the national roaming mobile operator MegaFon. Agreement with Beeline was torn. On April 12, 2011 in the competition number 1/2011 TELE2 won the right to provide mobile communication GSM-1800 in Chukotka, Sakhalin and Kamchatsky Krai. On April 26, 2011 in the competition number 4/2011 TELE2 won the right to provide mobile communication GSM-1800 in the Magadan Oblast and the Jewish Autonomous Region. September 1, 2011 Tele2 has updated line tariffs and clearance in Russia changed the overall design of the countries where Tele2. September 20, 2011 the company announced the resumption of cooperation in the sphere of national roaming with Beeline. On February 28, 2013 , the company announced the provision of services to its customers due to national roaming mobile operator MTS.

On March 27, 2013 it was announced that the Swedish group Tele2 decided to sell Russian subsidiary Tele2 Russia VTB Group. April 4 deal was completed. June 24, 2013 the company announced the acquisition of mobile operator Voronezh Kodotel.

On October 17, 2013 closing of the sale of VTB 50% shares of the company Tele2 Russia to a consortium of private investors holding bank "Rossiya", including Yury Kovalchuk, a personal friend of President Vladimir Putin and co-founder of the cooperative "Ozero" and now Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Bank Rossiya and Alexei Mordashov, co-owner of" Severstal.

On February 2014 Tele2 Russia has introduced the SFH (slow frequency hopping) technology on its network in the Smolensk region. The technology enables improved call transfer and GPRS speeds, raising the base station efficiency by 20 percent. The SFH enables the operator to serve each call with the nearest base station, allowing more efficient spectrum use through automatic modification of the radio signal using a special algorithm.^[1]

Joint venture with Rostelecom

According to the plan combined mobile operator will be based on "Tele2 Russia", but rather on the basis of "T2 Russian holding". "T2 Rus Holding" to increase authorized capital in favor of "Rostelecom", which will pay its share of mobile assets, and a consortium of private shareholders "Russia" and VTB Group, which now doubles to 100% "T2 Rus Holding" reduce the proportion of up to 51-60%, and "Rostelecom" will receive 40-49%. That is OJSC "Rostelecom" after the transfer of mobile assets will be present in OOO "T2 Russian holding" only as a minority shareholder with a share of less than 50%. A VTB Group, along with a consortium of private shareholders "Russia", headed by Yuri Kovalchuk will take major decisions on the holding, if they can agree.

Association will be held in two stages. At the first stage until the end of 2013, T2 receives "Skylink" and several other daughter companies of Rostelecom, which is easiest to prepare for the transfer.^[2] At the second stage in 2014, will move to T2 assets that the company Rostelecom has yet to prepare for transfer, including mobile assets Macro-region branch «Ural».

Also on the second stage of "Rostelecom" must pass LLC "T2 Rus Holding" license for the second generation of communication (2G/GSM, 2.5G/GPRS, 2.75G/EDGE) in those regions where the "Tele2 Russia" has no license, the third generation communication (3G/UMTS) and licenses for the fourth generation of communication (4G/LTE) in the range 2.3-2.4 GHz and 2.6 GHz. The new federal operator will be branded as RT-Mobile (Russian: РТ-Мобайл).

References

External links

• Tele2 Russia Website (English)