WIND Mobile will be bought by Russian company VimpelCom

This is very loud news. Tony Lakavera, chairman of Globalive, a company that owns the WIND Mobile brand, announced today at windmobile.ca that Wind Telecom will be bought by VimpelCom, a Russian telecommunications company, for $ 6 billion.



Lacavera explained the following:

“Earlier today, the shareholders of VimpelCom, a Russian mobile operator, voted to support a $ 6 billion acquisition of WIND Telecom, whose assets include Orascom Telecom, a major shareholder in WIND Mobile. The parties are currently discussing the completion of the transaction. which seems to happen in the first half of 2011.

This transaction will create the fifth largest in the world by the number of subscribers of the mobile operator - more than 173 million subscribers!
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This is good news for us. Our financial partner, Orascom, will be even bigger and stronger. This will give us an increase in cooperation with manufacturers of telecommunications network equipment and, more importantly, mobile devices, including mobile phones and tablets. It will also give us greater access to international cooperation for roaming and services over long distances. All this will give the ability to provide even more value to all our customers.

I will keep you updated as new details appear. „

This is a very interesting development. This could mean an improvement in international tariffs for WIND subscribers, as well as more capital for purchasing hardware, network equipment for cheaper and more affordable operator services.

The structure of the transaction should be interesting, given that WIND in the past had a nasty international transaction in the past. We will wait for the reaction of CRTC and other telecommunications companies.