The Russian Antimonopoly Service allowed Rostelecom, the national telecom operator, to acquire 100% of the shares of Enter, a provider of fixed broadband Internet access in Siberia owned by the Dutch company Consumer Enter B. V.
Established in 2005, Enter serves 22,000 customers in Barnaul, Novokuznetsk and Tyumen, three major Siberian cities.
Rostelecom’s move marks yet another step in its plan to create a combined telecommunication infrastructure and extend its range of services across the country. Among its latest acquisitions was Qwerty, in October 2011, a broadband Internet provider operating in Moscow.
Rostelecom owns a nationwide fiber-optic backbone network and is developing Internet, VPN, intelligent network services (INS), and videoconferencing, among other services. The company is also pursuing some mobile telecommunications ambitions by acquiring regional operators and bidding for GSM licenses in several regions.
“We are creating the first universal operator, [integrating] a variety of networks and services in all regions of Russia,” Rostelecom representative Oleg Rumyantsev said last April.
Sources: Vedomosti, Svyazinvest
