As it
was easily understandable given the appeal of the Syrian mobile market, six
telecom companies have submitted bids for the third mobile communications
license (it has a 20-year validity) in Syria. Regional and international
operators are vying for this third mobile license that should increase the
level of competition in the mobile market, which is expected to double in
size by 2014. Moreover, the government has specified that once this license
will be awarded, there won’t be any new licenses for the next three
years.
Notwithstanding
the close political relations between Syria and Iran, Iran’s state-owned Tamin
Telecom Company (Tamco) seems to be the competitor with fewer chances to get
the license. In fact, already the pre-qualification criteria appear to be a
difficult hurdle to overcome for this quite new Iranian company. According to
its website, Tamco was established three years ago and it is currently
operating only in one country: Iran. Recently, this year, Tamco has won the
third mobile license awarded in Iran. Tamco belongs to Shams Tamin High Tech Investment
Company, one of the ten holdings of Iran’s Social Security Investment
Company (S.S.I.C.), which is the company that manages pension funds in
Iran. Not being successful in raising financing resources — given the
international sanctions applied to Iran — could be another big difficulty
for Tamco.
Some
telecoms executives evaluate that competition for the third Syrian license
will be fierce because the bidders constitute an interesting group of companies
mixing both relevant economic resources, like Saudi Telecom, Qtel and Etisalat
(their respective governments have important equity stakes in the companies and
all the three companies have already implemented an expansion strategy in the
MENA region) and significant knowledge of MENA’s telecoms markets, like France
Telecom and Turkcell. In particular, Turkcell — the leading operator in Turkey
— has already quite good an understanding of the Syrian telecoms, given its
attempt to purchase Syriatel in December 2007.
The
current six bids will be assessed by a joint committee formed by Syria’s
Ministry of Communications and Technology (MOCT) and by Germany’s Detecon, an
advisory consultancy. By the end of December 2010, this joint committee has to
evaluate the applications of the six candidates and decide which companies are
allowed to the second phase of the competition. The decision will be taken
according to the following pre-qualification criteria:
Some
sources inside the telecoms sector in Syria point out that it is quite possible
that the winner will be the company offering the highest sum. Minister of
Communications and Technology Imad Sabouni said that the reference price for
the license is around S£25bn (US$500m), reported the Syrian newspaper Al
Watan.