Mobiltel

Mobiltel

Type	joint stock company
Industry	mobile telecommunications
Founded	1994
Headquarters	Sofia, Bulgaria
Key people	Andreas Maierhofer, CEO
Products	mobile / fixed telephony, Internet services, Digital TV services
Revenue	€614.7 million (2009) [1]
Net income	€147.9 million (2009) [2]
Website	www.mtel.bg

Mobiltel ("Мобилтел" /network code 284-01/), commonly known as M-Tel (М-Tел), is the first and largest GSM mobile phone operator in Bulgaria. M-Tel was founded in March 1994 by Mr. Krassimir Stoitcheff but was not launched commercially until September 1995 (as Citron^[3]).

In 2001 M-Tel launched its pre payment sim cards which allow customers to purchase credits prior to calling friends, this was a great success and saw the amount of customers using their network increase dramatically.

The company had a market share of about 58% and 3,000,000 clients in September 2004. On 14 September 2006 M-Tel reached 4,000,000 clients. As of May 2006 the company has 4,400,000 subscribers and its market share fell to 51,1%. Its contract customers increased to 1,7 mln, while the profit per customer dropped to 9,9 euro for Q1 2007.[4]

The operator has been owned by Mobilkom Austria Group since July 2005, when it was acquired for up to €1.6 billion in one of Eastern Europe's largest deals and one of the largest foreign investments in Austria's history. On 22 February 2006, the company signed a partner network agreement with Vodafone. Mobiltel was the first Bulgarian operator to offer EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA and HSPA+ services to its clients, with video telephony services being available since 6 March 2006 in the capital Sofia and since mid-July 2006 throughout the Bulgarian Black Sea resorts [5].

The company provides sending free SMS messages to its customers from the Internet.

The company is the official sponsor of Bulgarian football club PFC Levski Sofia. Since 2005, the company also organizes the strong annual M-Tel Masters chess tournament, which is attended by six of the world's best International Grandmasters.

In 2010 Mobiltel launched a new CRM (Customer Relations Management) system, part of which was a new billing system. For the implementation of the new platform the company works with the international company Amdocs (www.аmdocs.com) Mobiltel changed its customer’s platform in order to provide in future better service based on the individual relations. The new service platform will allow the company proactively to offer each of its customers certain products or services from its rich portfolio, suitable for their way of life and communication, thus developing its corporate philosophy centered on the customers.

Despite the difficult economical environment effecting the entire IT and Telco industry in Bulgaria, Mobiltel's performance remain stable with a customer base of 5.3 mio. The postpaid subscribers increased from 61% to roughly 66%. Mobiltel's market share by end Q1/2011 stays at 49.3% . Additional information from the Financial Report on the First Quarter of 2011 could be found at: www.mtel.bg

Mobiltel owns Loop - the largest virtual mobile operator operating in Bulgaria, specially designed for young customers.

External links

• Actual coverage
• Official website (in Bulgarian)
• Official website (in English)