ISLAMABAD: VimpelCom, Global Telecom Holding (GTH), together with Warid Telecom Pakistan and Bank Alfalah (Dhabi Group shareholders) on Friday announced the completion of the transaction to merge Pakistan Mobile Communications Limited (Mobilink) and Warid Telecom (Warid).

Over 50 million customers in Pakistan will benefit from high-speed mobile telecommunications and a best-in-class digital mobile network.

The combined Mobilink and Warid entity will be the leading telecommunications provider of 2G, 3G and LTE services in Pakistan, providing higher quality national voice and data coverage, faster downloads, and a wider portfolio of products and services.

Mobilink and Warid will benefit from VimpelCom’s USD 1 billion1 investment into building one of the largest and most ambitious IT infrastructures in the industry.

The Group’s new digital systems will enable faster roll-out of new local products and services, particularly in the areas of mobile entertainment, communications, the Internet of

With the completion of the merger transaction, Mobilink now enters the next major phase of its transformation and Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Hedberg will hand over the CEO role of Mobilink and Warid to Aamir Ibrahim, currently Chief Commercial Officer and Deputy CEO of Mobilink.

Aamir will drive forward and execute the Mobilink and Warid integration, supported by a world-class transformation team from the VimpelCom Group.

The legal merger of the two companies, which will result in one merged legal entity having the same board, and management described above, is expected to be completed within approximately six months, subject to the fulfilment of the required legal processes in Pakistan. Mobilink and Warid will shortly file a petition to the Islamabad
High Court in order to commence the process of legal merger.

As previously stated, the transaction is expected to create capex and opex synergies with a net present value of approximately USD 500 million with an annual run rate of well over USD 100 million of free cash flow improvements by year three. The combined revenue of both companies for the 12 months to March 2016 was USD 1.4 billion4. — PRESS RELEASE