Posts tagged Orascom
Koryolink nears 2 million subscribers
Apr 26th
Koryolink, North Korea’s sole 3G cellular service provider, is close to hitting the 2 million subscriber mark.
The news was disclosed this week by the Koryolink CEO Ezz Heikal in Pyongyang and later confirmed by the company’s head office in Cairo. It means that Koryolink will have roughly doubled its subscriber base in the last 15 months. Koryolink hit a million subscribers in early February 2012.
Only a few years ago it would have been unusual to see anyone in Pyongyang speaking on a cell phone, but that all began to change in December 2008 when Koryolink launched its service. It’s now available across Pyongyang, More >
Koryolink to give foreigners mobile data
Feb 22nd
Foreigners visiting North Korea should be able to get mobile data service on their cellphones within the coming week, according to a report on Friday.
Koryolink, the country’s only 3G cellphone network, plans to allow visitors to buy mobile Internet when they arrive in the country, the AP said in a report from Pyongyang. The service will launch by March 1, it said.
North Koreans will still be banned from accessing the Internet.
The addition of mobile Internet comes several weeks after North Korea reversed a long-standing policy that banned visitors from bringing cellphones into the country. They were previously taken by customs officials More >
Orascom CEO back in Pyongyang
Oct 6th
The CEO of Egypt’s Orascom Telecom Media and Technology (OTMT), which owns 75 percent of North Korea’s sole 3G cellular operator, is back in Pyongyang, according to KCNA. [Updated. See below]
The North Korean news agency said Naguib Sawiris arrived on October 4 with four colleagues. It provided a couple of pictures of Sawiris and his party at the airport.
From the airport, Sawiris went to the Mansudae Art Studio where he visited the equestrian statues of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il and paid his respects. He laid a bouquet and “paid tribute to the peerlessly great persons,” according to the KCNA report.
Later More >
North Korea cell phone ban report incorrect, says Orascom
Feb 15th
North Koreans have not been banned from using mobile phones during a mourning period for Kim Jong Il despite a press report to the contrary, according to the majority owner of North Korea’s nationwide cellular network.
The U.K.’s Daily Telegraph newspaper reported on January 26th that the North Korean government had warned citizens they would be “branded as ‘war criminals’ and punished accordingly” if caught attempting to defect or use mobile phones during a 100-day period of national mourning.
The report was widely picked up by other news outlets, including Forbes, Foreign Policy, Global Post, and Computerworld and made for great headlines (“In N. Korea, use a cellphone and die”), but there More >
Koryolink hits a million subscribers
Feb 3rd
Koryolink, North Korea’s only commercial 3G cell phone network, has signed up its millionth subscriber. The landmark was reached just over three years since service was launched.
Koryolink has been adding more than 100,000 new subscribers for each of the last five quarters and was expected to hit the million mark in early 2012.
The company is operated by Cheo Technology, which is a joint venture between Egypt’s Orascom Telecom Media And Technology Holding (OTMT) and North Korea’s Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. OTMT holds a 75 percent stake and the North Korean government owns the remaining 25 percent.
Koryolink’s service has popularized cell More >
Koryolink sponsors Taekwondo championship
Nov 19th
This week’s earnings report for Koryolink, North Korea’s only widely available cell phone service, highlighted something I missed back in September: the company was a major sponsor of the 17th Taekwondo World Championships. The event took place in Pyongyang from September 6th to 12th.
Koryolink banners were strung around the Taekwando Hall where the international contest was taking place, as can be seen in video from KCNA. The company even had one on the front of the judges desk.
In its earnings report Orascom Telecom, the Egypt-based telecommunications company that holds a majority stake in Koryolink, said the deal was unique in North More >
Koryolink surpasses 800,000 3G subscriptions
Nov 18th
North Korea’s nationwide 3G cellular network could miss an end-of-year target to have a million subscribers despite two successive quarters of record subscriber growth.
Koryolink added 142,000 subscriptions in the third quarter, beating the 131,000 subscriptions added in the previous three months, to end September with 809,000 users. That leaves it 191,000 subscribers short of hitting a million users — a 2011 target that had been talked about at the beginning of the year. Based on current subscriber growth it appears that Koryolink will come close to the million mark but — barring a surge of new sign-ups in the current quarter — More >
Orascom planning 3G Internet service
Oct 17th
Orascom Telecom is planning to add Internet service to its 3G cellular offering in North Korea, according to the Choson Exchange blog.
Writing in a post on Sunday, Geoffrey K. See, the organization’s executive director and founder, says the service is currently being tested but should be available in the near future. The information on the service came from a meeting with Orascom employees in Pyongyang.
At first it will be available to resident foreigners living in Pyongyang. So far there is no approval for a wider service, even in censored form, for the North Korean subscribers. Orascom didn’t provide any details on More >
Koryolink sees another record quarter
Aug 25th
Koryolink, North Korea’s only 3G network operator, added a record number of subscribers in the second quarter of 2011, but the company will have to push harder if it’s to reach a million users by the end of the year.
The company ended the quarter with 666,517 subscribers, according to Orascom Telecom. Egypt’s Orascom holds a 75 percent stake in Cheo Technology, which operates the service under the Koryolink brand name. The remaining 25 percent stake is held by the government-owned Korea Posts and Telecommunications Co. (KPTC).
The company added 131,384 subscribers during the April to June quarter, putting the quarter just More >
Koryolink hits half a million 3G subscriptions
May 20th
Are things starting to get tough for Koryolink?
North Korea’s only 3G cellular provider has published its quarterly results and the headline numbers look good.
Subscriptions are at a record 535,133 and quarterly revenue has never been higher at US$25.8 million, but look a little closer and you’ll see the company is having to push harder to get new customers and existing customers are spending less.
Quarterly growth was 103,214 subscriptions, the third highest yet recorded since service began in the final weeks of 2008. That growth made the January to March quarter the first since mid 2009 where quarter-on-quarter growth failed to More >
