16 Mar 2008

World Roaming Champions

World Roaming Champions

The Russian Vimpelcom Company has become the world leader both by the number of roaming partners and by the number of roaming countries, analysts at J'son & Partners believe. Megafon is also in the top-10 by the number of roaming countries. The largest world operators are not among the leaders because of their strategy to focus on the most popular roaming directions and conclude only one-two agreements in one country.

The Vimpelcom Company (Beeline trademark) is acknowledged by J’son & Partners analysts the leader in international roaming. The indices of the companies operating in GSM and UMTS (3G) were counted when making up the rating. The survey reads that when preparing the report Vimpelcom had 487 roaming partners in 202 countries. The Turkish operator Turkcell (479 agreements) and Canadian Rogers Wireless (457 agreements) are in the top-three. The forth is the Ukrainian operator Astelit with 455 partners.

By the number of countries covered by roaming, Vimpelcom is followed by the Chilean operator Telefonica Movil de Chile, Turkcell and the French Orange with 199 countries each. Astelit is the fifth with 198 countries. Megafon has also entered the top-10 with 197 countries. The total number of officially recognized states exceeds 220.

Vimpelcom specifies that currently they are cooperating with 497 partners in 205 countries. ‘We have been actively developing the given business line recently, concluding agreements with various operators all over the world to enable our subscribers to stay in touch in any part of the world’, - says Yekaterina Osadchaya, Vimpelcom’s press secretary.

Sergey Savin, J’son & Partners’s leading analyst, points out that currently about 15% of the operator’s revenue comes from roaming.

Top-10 operators by the number of roaming partners

No

Operator

Country

Number of Partners

1

VimpelCom

Russia

487

2

Turkcell Iletisim Hizmetleri A.S.

Turkey

479

3

Rogers Wireless Inc

Canada

457

4

Astelit LLC

Ukraine

455

5

TIM Italia Mobile

Italy

433

6

Telefonica Movil de Chile

Chile

430

7

Telsim [Vodafone]

Turkey

430

8

Telefonica Moviles Espana S.A.

Spain

427

9

Telefonica Moviles S.A.

Peru

415

10

Telefonica Moviles Panama, S.A.

Panama

408

Source: J’son & Partners

According to J’son & Partners’s specialists, under conditions of market saturation large communications companies operating within one country offer their existing and possible subscribers with a standard package of tariffs and services. So dominating the services provided in one of the parameters is positively affecting such an important factor as loyalty and helps attract new subscribers.

Top-10 by the number of roaming countries

No

Operator

Country

Number of countries

1

VimpelCom

Russia

202

2

Telefonica Movil de Chile

Chile

199

3

Turkcell Iletisim Hizmetleri A.S.

Turkey

199

4

Orange France

France

199

5

Astelit LLC

Ukraine

198

6

IAM

Morocco

198

7

MegaFon

Russia

197

8

AT&T Mobility

US

197

9

O2 (UK) Limited

Great Britain

196

10

TIM Italia Mobile

Italy

195

Source: J’son & Partners

While reading the survey, some specialists were surprised that small operator entered the top-10. ‘The question is how the Chilean Telefonica entered the top-10 and the Spanish Telefonica did not’, - one of CNews’s correspondents is puzzled. Mr. Savin relates the absence of leading world operators in the following way: ‘Large communications operators prefer cooperating with one-two companies when concluding roaming agreements, while in terms of geography the most popular directions are of priority. For some mobile operators providing their customers with vaster possibilities is part of marketing policy’. ‘It is important that for largest world operators roaming efficiency is determined not by the total number of partner operators but by the revenue from roaming directions’, - MTS concludes.

MTS, which is the largest operator in CIS by its subscriber base, reports that currently agreements with 490 communications companies in 202 countries have been concluded. If the survey was held at present, then the company would enter the top-10. ‘In 2008 MTS intends to expand its roaming coverage and provide its subscribers with largely convenient and comfortable roaming conditions’, - the operator’s press service reports.

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