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Home > Communications > Telecommunications > General Telecom
Qatar Telecommunications Report Q4 2008
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It was announced at the end of June that Qatar’s second mobile network operator, Vodafone Qatar, hadbeen officially awarded its licence to operate within the country. Vodafone revealed that its shareholders,Vodafone Group of the UK and its local partner the Qatar Foundation, would pay QAR7.716bn(US$2.1bn) for the license. Immediately after receiving its mobile network operating licence, VodafoneQatar confirmed that it planned to launch commercial services on 1 March 2009. In the meantime theUK-backed company said it would be negotiating an infrastructure sharing agreement with incumbentoperator Q-Tel to help it achieve nationwide coverage. Ahead of its network launch, Vodafone Qatar willoffer 40% of its shares to investors in an IPO scheduled for September-October, and no later than30 November.
Despite its already high mobile penetration rates, BMI predicts that mobile growth will continue over thenext five years. Although Vodafone Qatar is expected to benefit from new customer growth, the secondoperator will also erode the market share currently possessed by Q-Tel. Although we expect the rate ofsubscriber growth to slow considerably over the five forecast years, a high number of inactive prepaidusers, as well as an expanding population, will ensure that a certain amount of mobile growth continues.
Meanwhile, there is still no news as to whether Qatar will see the award of a second fixed-line networkoperating licence anytime soon. In December 2007, the ictQATAR launched an auction for the country’ssecond fixed-line network operating licence. Although the regulator is understood to have receivedexpressions of interest from several international network operators, there has been no recent news onwhether it is close to selecting a winner. We continue to believe that the launch of services by a secondfixed-line operator will have a positive impact on both fixed-line and broadband subscriber growth.
Continued demand for fixed-line services has been boosted by Qatar’s expanding economy and by anexpanding business sector. Fixed-line growth has also been supported by the need for ADSL customers tohave an underlying fixed line connection, regardless of whether they use the voice service. BMI alsopredicts that Qatar’s broadband market will experience higher levels of investment and heightenedcompetition once the country’s second fixed-line operator launches commercial services.
One of the most notable developments in our latest set of Business Environment Rankings for the MiddleEast has been the ascendance of Qatar from eighth to third place in our table. Qatar’s overall score hasbenefited from higher scores in both the telecoms market and country structure categories. In the currentupdate, Qatar receives a lower score for regulatory independence.
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