Investment of $1 billion will be made in Pakistan over the next five years, VimpelCom Chief Executive Officer Jean-Yves Charlier said on Wednesday.
Addressing a press conference, he said, “Mobilink and Warid will benefit from VimpelCom’s $1 billion investment in building one of the largest and most ambitious IT infrastructures in the industry.
The new digital systems will enable faster roll-out of new local products and services, particularly in the areas of mobile entertainment, communications, the internet of things and mobile financial services.”
He said that 50,000 new jobs across Pakistan will also be created in the next five years. “Merger of Mobilink-Warid is a win-win situation for customers and for Pakistan,” he added.
Over 50 million customers in Pakistan will benefit from high-speed mobile telecommunications and a best-in-class digital mobile network. The combined Mobilink and Warid entity will become the leading telecommunications provider of 2G, 3G and LTE services in Pakistan, providing higher quality national voice and data coverage, faster downloads, and a wider portfolio of products and services.
He said around 1500 Mobilink-Warid franchisee shops would be opened across the country. The CEO said, “Our focus in future will be to improve and provide better services to the customers.”
He said that 38 million customers of Mobilink will be provided 4G while 12 million consumers of Warid will be given 3G services.
“We have made a commitment with Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif during a meeting to provide our services to remote areas,” he added.
To a question he said, “Pakistan has a quality and dynamic workforce”.
To another question, he said Mobilink’s turnaround over the past two years has shown significant improvements in service revenue growth from -5% to +12%.
