(MENAFN- Gulf Times) Ooredoo, whose brand equity is now valued at $1.7bn (QR6.19bn), is aiming to capture a sizeable share in the global converging communications market as a shift to a digital world has opened up vast opportunities, a top official has said.
"The shift to a digital world opens up significant opportunities for Ooredoo. Our customers demand increasingly ubiquitous access to data-based services delivered by world leading, super-fast networks," Ooredoo group chief executive Dr Nasser Marafih yesterday told investors and analysts at its annual Capital Markets Day.
The discussions with investors and analysts highlighted Ooredoo, which has more than 114mn customers globally, has successfully progressed against its strategy to position it at the heart of a digital world and capture the value of a global, converging communications market.
Highlighting that the Ooredoo brand now operates in seven of its markets and its brand equity is now independently valued at $1.7bn, Marafih said Ooredoo now has 4G in five out of its nine markets, which is driving strong data revenue growth, which accounts for 30% of total group revenue.
"We are generating significant cost synergies across the group through global efficiency programmes, as well as benefiting from investing in standardised technologies and pursuing infrastructure sharing agreements," he said.
New revenue opportunities are being generated through initiatives such as the global B2B business which targets the communication needs of the business customers, Marafih said, adding $1.3bn of B2B revenue was generated in 2014 with a 25% increase in customer growth.
"Our e-commerce strategy with Rocket Internet is also making good progress with initial investments in Asia," Marafih said.
Ooredoo is now present in markets such as Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Algeria, Tunisia, Iraq, Palestine, the Maldives, Myanmar and Indonesia.
The event, which was attended by more than 70 participants, also saw presentations by the heads of Ooredoo's finance, strategy and B2B teams as well as the senior management of Ooredoo Qatar and Ooredoo Algeria.
A double-digit increase in earnings from Qatar and Oman helped Ooredoo Group report a consolidated net profit of QR501mn on stable revenue of QR8.04bn in the first quarter of 2015.
Ooredoo Qatar's net profit alone jumped 88% to QR616mn on an 18% rise in Ebitda (earnings before interest taxes depreciation and amortisation) to QR980mn and sale of investments in the first three months of this year.
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