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New CEO of Uzbek TeliaSonera subsidiary appointed

Uzbekistan Materials 3 September 2014 16:26 (UTC +04:00)
Tonu Grunberg, currently holding the position of vice president for technology in the region of Eurasia, has been appointed Director-General of the Coscom mobile operator (a subsidiary of Scandinavian TeliaSonera in Uzbekistan, Ucell trademark)
New CEO of Uzbek TeliaSonera subsidiary appointed

Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Sept. 3

By Demir Azizov- Trend:

Tonu Grunberg, currently holding the position of vice president for technology in the region of Eurasia, has been appointed Director-General of the Coscom mobile operator (a subsidiary of Scandinavian TeliaSonera in Uzbekistan, Ucell trademark). Grunberg will assume his new duties on September 15, 2014, the TeliaSonera reported Sept.3.

Grunberg will succeed Osman Turan, who worked as the Ucell CEO since June 2013.

Tonu Grunberg worked in the leading mobile operator in Estonia, a part of the TeliaSonera group and then as a vice president in the region of Eurasia during the last three years, the Scandinavian company says. He has been a board member of EMT since 1996, and was responsible for the technology, as well as for the development and management of products.

COSCOM LLC was founded in 1996. In July 2007, Fintur Holdings B.V., controlled by TeliaSonera, acquired 100 percent of the assets of the U.S. MCT Corp, which owned stakes in Coscom.

Starting from June 2008, the operator began providing mobile services in Uzbekistan under the Ucell brand name, working under the GSM-900-1800 standard. In February 2009, Ucell launched 3G for commercial operations, and in July 2010 - the network of the fourth generation (4G) in Tashkent based on LTE (Long-Term Evolution) technology.

Currently, TeliaSonera owns 94 percent of the shares of the operator, while Uzbek minor shareholders hold 6 percent.

Ucell increased its net revenues by 31.6 percent in the end of 2013 - up to 3.118 billion of Swedish kronor ($478.2 million), earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization increased by 85.8 percent - up to 1 68 billion kronor ($257.6 million).

Average usage of minutes per subscriber per month in Ucell network by the end of 2013 increased 4 percent up to 266 minutes.

Ucell subscriber base by the end of 2013 decreased 10.3 percent to 8,496 million people due to the fact that in the first quarter of last year the company wrote off more than 1.5 million of inactive users.

At present, there are 4 mobile operators in the mobile communication services market: Unitel LLC (Beeline trademark), COSCOM FE LLC, RWC FE LLC (Perfectum Mobile TM) and the Uzmobile branch of Uzbektelecom JSC.

As of January 1, 2013, the market shares of the participants in terms of services rendered are as follows: Beeline - 54 percent, Ucell - 41 percent, and those operating under CDMA standard- Rubicon Wireless Communications JV (RWC, Perfectum Mobile trademark) - 3 percent and Uzbektelekom Mobile branch - Uzbektelecom JSC - 1 percent.

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