Image: Reuters Berita 24 English - The only foreign telecom provider in the nation, Ooredoo, a Qatari company, is in talks to sell its opera...
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| Image: Reuters |
Berita 24 English - The only foreign telecom provider in the nation, Ooredoo, a Qatari company, is in talks to sell its operations in Myanmar, according to two people with knowledge of the situation who spoke to Reuters.
The sources claimed that Doha-based Ooredoo has informed Myanmar's Posts and Telecommunications Department (PTD), the nation's regulator, of its intention to sell a division that ranked third among operators in Myanmar in 2020 with nearly 15 million customers, before the market was upended by the military coup in February 2021.
According to a source with firsthand knowledge of the situation, the company's top prospective purchasers include the Myanmar conglomerate Young Investment Group, the network infrastructure provider Campana Group with headquarters in Singapore, and the telecom firm SkyNet. Shwe Than Lwin, a Myanmar organisation, owns Skynet.
According to the sources, negotiations with the three suitors are still in the preliminary stages.
Email inquiries for comment from Ooredoo did not immediately receive a response.
Calls to the PTD, Skynet, the Young Investment Group, and a junta spokesperson for Myanmar went unanswered. The Campana Group stated it had nothing to say right away.
The sources did not estimate the size of the potential sale and declined to be identified out of respect for their anonymity.
The amount that Ooredoo has invested in Myanmar is unknown at this time, according to Reuters. According to its earnings, Ooredoo had 9 million customers in 2022, down from 15 million in 2020, when it reported sales of roughly $330 million.
After formerly being one of Asia's marketplaces with the greatest growth rates, the telecoms industry in Myanmar has come under significant pressure ever since the military took control in 2021. After nationwide internet limitations for the entirety of 2021, mobile data is still unavailable in some areas of the nation.
The central bank of Myanmar instructed local businesses and banks to postpone and reschedule the repayment of foreign debts earlier this week.
After Telenor of Norway's arduous exit from the country in March of this year, Ooredoo is the last majority foreign-owned telecom provider in Myanmar.
The former Telenor subsidiary in the nation is currently majority-owned by the Myanmar company Shwe Byain Phyu, with Lebanese investment company M1 acquiring a minority share.
Other telecom service providers in the nation include Mytel, a joint venture between the Myanmar army and Viettel, which is operated by the Vietnamese defence ministry, and MPT, a sizable state-backed operator.
In 2021, Telenor informed Reuters that due to "continuous pressure" from the junta to activate intercept monitoring technologies, it was necessary to sell its operations in order to avoid European Union sanctions.
According to Reuters, a classified PTD directive prohibiting senior foreign telecoms executives from leaving the country without authorization was issued in July 2021. A second ruling mandating telecoms companies to fully activate the intercept was issued after the travel ban.
