Russian national telecom operator Rostelecom has increased its stake in regional operator Orenburg GSM from 51% to 100%, news agency RIA Novosti reported last week. The remaining 49% stake was sold for $4 million by Samara based operator SMARTS.
Orenburg GSM provides network services in the Orenburg region. The company’s consumer base as of the end of Q1 2011 totaled 185,000 users.
A week before, Rostelecom also acquired from SMART a 50% stake in another regional operator, Volgograd GSM, for $80.5 million.
When it won GSM licenses in three regions in April, Rostelecom – originally a fixed-line operator – indicated it would bid for licenses in all the regions where it is still not present. “Rostelecom does not aim at becoming just the fourth nationwide mobile operator. We are in the process of creating the first universal operator, [integrating] a variety of networks and services in all regions of Russia,” said Rostelecom representative Oleg Rumyantsev.
Some industry experts have even speculated on a possible merger with MegaFon or MTS, two of the three leading Russian mobile operators.
Skylink, a leading Russian 3G operator currently owned by Svyazinvest, Rostelecom’s main shareholder, could also switch over to Rostelecom ownership, RIA Novosti reported.
Rostelecom itself has licenses to provide telecommunication services in the 2.3-2.4 Ghz frequency range, which can be used for LTE and is also a member of the consortium appointed by the government in January 2011 to study possible LTE deployment scenarios.
Rostelecom also owns a nationwide fiber-optic backbone network and is developing Internet, VPN, intelligent network services (INS), and videoconferencing, among others services.
Having recently completed a large reorganization and merger process with its regional affiliates, Rostelecom is expected to be privatized sometime after 2013.
