VTB Group
Who was the owner of Tele2 Russia from 2013 to 2014?
Tele2 Russia Tele2 Russia is a Russian telecommunications company originally founded by Swedish Tele2 . It has been operating since 2003 . Since 2020 , Tele2 Russia is a wholly owned subsidiary of Rostelecom . At year-end 2019 , Tele2 Russia provides wireless services to more than 44.6 million subscribers . As of beginning of April 2019 , Tele2 is present in 67 subjects of Russia . Tele2 Russia functions as a group of companies , and the parent structure of the holding is named Limited Liability Company T2 RTK Holding with the headquarters in Moscow . Now the Russian company Tele2 Russia and the Swedish Tele2 AB are interconnected through the common brand and the corporate values of Tele2Way , which both companies propagate . Tele2Way values were established by the founder of the company Jan Stenbeck , and they reveal the essence of the company operation . History . The history of the company began in the 1990s when the American-Swedish Millicom International Cellular established mobile network operators which provided D-AMPS services in various regions of Russia . In 2001 Millicom sold its Russian assets to the Swedish holding Tele2 , which started implementing GSM services in its networks and moved them to their own brand . Tele2 started operations in Russia in 2003 . Within the first two years of operation in the Russian market ( 2003–2004 ) Tele2 started providing services in 12 regions . On March 27 , 2013 , it was announced that the Swedish group Tele2 decided to sell its Russian subsidiary Tele2 Russia to the VTB Group . On April 4 , the deal was completed . On October 17 , 2013 , the VTB Group closed the selling of 50% of Tele2 Russia shares to a consortium of private investors holding the Rossiya Bank , including Yury Kovalchuk ( the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Rossiya Bank ) and Alexei Mordashov ( the Severstal co-owner ) , and also 5% of the shares were sold to Sogaz insurance group . On February 6 , 2014 , Rostelecom and Tele2 Russia signed a framed agreement on integration of mobile assets into the ownership capital of the joint venture ( JV ) T2 Rus Holding . This deal resulting in creation of a new federal high roller on the cellular market was completed within a year . According to the terms of the agreement , Rostelecom transferred its assets to the JV and became one of the stakeholders of the merged company . The joint venture was created on the basis of T2 Rus Holding ( later renamed into T2 RTK Holding ) , which owns all the operating companies of Tele2 Russia . On March 28 , 2014 , the first stage of the deal on integration of Rostelecom mobile assets and creation of a new federal cell operator was completed . Seven Rostelecom subsidiaries — Sky Link , , , BIT , Volgograd GSM , and AKOS-came under the operational and financial control of Tele2 Russia . Tele2 Russia also gained operational control over Rostelecoms mobile integrated assets ( Eline GSM , Tambov GSM , Uralsvyazinform , Dalsvyaz ) through RT-Mobile , an affiliate of Rostelecom , established on April 1 , 2014 . As a result , Rostelecom became the joint venturer with a share in the authorized capital of 45% in votes and 26% of economic share . On August 5 , 2014 , earlier than scheduled , Rostelecom completed the second and final stage of the deal with Tele2 Russia to create a new federal mobile operator , having transferred 100% of the shares of its affiliate RT-Mobile to the joint venture ( JV ) . As part of the reorganization , Rostelecoms integrated mobile assets were allocated to RT-Mobile and also the licenses were reissued for the company . The deal resulted in transfer of all Rostelecoms mobile assets to the JV . Consequently , Rostelecom became the joint venturer with a share in the authorized capital of 45% in votes and 45% of economic share , and Tele2 Russia represented by the newly established T2 RTK Holding gained a share in the authorized capital of 55% in votes and 55% of economic share , meaning that Tele2 Russia took control over the joint venture . Thus , it was the completion of creation of a national mobile operator with a wide range of licenses and frequencies throughout the country ( including 3G and LTE ) , which was present in 64 regions and had a significant share of 16% on the cellular market , provided by more than 38 million mobile subscribers . On June 16 , 2015 , the mobile operator completed their corporate restructuring by associating 33 operational companies of the holding to its main structure T2 Mobile . The restructuring neither required financial contributions nor left jobcut behind it . As a result , the number of legal bodies within the structure of Tele2 Russia was fairly reduced . The parent company is T2 RTK Holding , and its wholly owned subsidiary Т2-Mobile undertakes business operations under the “Tele2” brand . On February 12 , 2020 , Rostelecom entered into a legally binding agreement on purchasing of 55% of T2 RTK Holding shares with VTB Bank and a consortium of investors . The settlement and transfer of ownership as part of the 100%-share consolidation transaction was completed on March 16 , 2020 . Ownership . Since February 2020 , the company is 100% owned by Rostelecom . Up intil February 2020 , each of the shareholders of T2RTK Holding had the right of preemption of the operator’s share . This rule was rooted in the holding’s Charter and it meant that if any of the owners received a proposal to sell his stake in total or partially , another owner could buy the stock at the price of the proposal within 30 days since the moment the third party claiming for purchase made the share sale offer . In March 2019 , it got about that Rostelecom would become the sole owner of Tele2 Russia , increasing its equity stake up to 100% . The information about it came up in January , and in February the Federal Agency for State Property Management ( Rosimushchestvo ) gave resolution to increase the share of the state-owned company . On March 12 , 2019 , it was announced that agreements on consolidating 100% of Tele2 Russia by Rostelecom were reached . It is specified that Rostelecom plans to preserve the brand and management of the company . According to Rostelecoms President Mikhail Oseevsky : Tele2 Russia has a strong team which proved successful with their results . On February 12 , 2020 , Rostelecom received 100% of T2 RTK Holding . 17.5% of Tele2 shares was bought with own funds of the public operator ; 27.5% was funded by the additional issue of Rostelecom shares in benefit of VTB , a further 10% was an exchange for 10% of its own common stock owned by its subsidiary Mobitel . On March 16 , 2020 , the settlement and ownership transfer as part of the 100%-share consolidation transaction was completed . Management . T2 RTK Holding board of directors . T2 RTK Holding board of directors : - Yury Solovyev , Senior Vice-President of VTB Bank , Chairman of the Board ; - Dmitry Dorozhevets , Executive Director of VTB Capital ; - Boyan Ivanovich , Managing Director of VTB Capital ; - Mikhail Oseevsky , President of Rostelecom ; - Sergei Anokhin , Senior Vice-President in charge of Finance of Rostelecom ; - Vladimir Kirienko , Senior Vice-President for Business Development and Management of Rostelecom ; - Anna Shumeiko , Senior Vice-President , the Chief of Staff of the President of Rostelecom ; - Dmitri Lebedev , Managing Director of ABR Management ; - Alexander Pentya , Deputy Director General of ABR Management ; - Roman Vasilkov , Head of Corporate Control at Severgroup ; - Bruno Ducharme , Head of the investment company TIW Capital Partners — non-executive Director . Management of Т2-Mobile . Management of Т2-Mobile : - Sergey Emdin , Director General ; - Alexander Provotorov , First Deputy Director ; - Andrey Patoka , Deputy Director General for product , marketing and federal customers ; - Dmitry Lopatukhin , Operational Director ; - Nikolay Surikov , CFO ; - Alexey Telkov , CTO ; - Svetlana Skvortsova , Head of Strategic Budgeting ; - Elena Ivanova , HR Director ; - Igor Maystrenko , Sales and Mass Segment Development Director ; - Alexander Rogovoy , Corporate Development Director . Operations . Tele2 in Russia is a mobile network operator providing services under the standards GSM , 3G and LTE . Before it was sold to VTB , it had been the only foreign company successfully operating on the Russian cellular market . Until 2013 , Russia for Tele2 AB was the major market , which , as of 2010 , provided more than a half of subscribers in total and 34.7% ( the biggest percentage among all the countries ) of EBITDA . In March 2020 , the company reported on financial and operational results for 2019 . As compared to 2018 , Tele2 Russia revenue rose 14% to 163,3 billion roubles , at year-end 2019 , the net profit totaled 6,6 billion roubles , the EBITDA increased by 50% and amounted to 65,6 billion roubles . As of December 31 , 2019 , the Tele2 Russia subscriber base counted 44.6 million people which is 5,3% more than in 2018 . The average revenue per user ( ARPU ) also increased by 8,3% to 305 roubles . According to the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications , Information Technology and Mass Media ( Roskomnadzor ) , in 2018 , Tele2 demonstrated the best result of the LTE networks development rate within the sector , having doubled the number of LTE cell sites . Lifestyle enabler . Originally , Tele2 Russia just like the Swedish company positioned itself as a discounter , accentuating the lowest price within the market . In 2016 , the company made a decision to move beyond and developed a new strategy named Lifestyle enabler . The model Lifestyle enabler means that Tele2 Russia supports its clients’ interests in all areas of life . Within the frames of this strategy , the operator creates services beyond the telecom industry in partnership with other business sectors . So that , in 2017 , they launched a joint service with the Clouty online platform , which is an aggregator of online retailers . In June 2018 , a digital medicine project – an application allowing to get a telemedical advice - was launched in partnership with the company Doc+ . Among the other programs of the operator , there is an affiliate loyalty program with cashback to a mobile account , taxi services ( joint service with ) . In October 2017 , Tele2 Russia started a loyalty program named “Bolshe” ( En : More ) which was intended for subscribers’ personal preferences . The operator offered to the customers an opportunity to save by two ways : either with the use of cashback or with discounts for partners’ goods and services . When choosing the cashback , a subscriber can get up to 40% of a products cost to his mobile account . The money can be spent for mobile services or mobile commerce “Payments and transfers” . Any Tele 2 Russia subscriber , except for corporate plans users , can participate in the loyalty program . The programs partners include Yandex , Shokoladnitsa , AliExpress , Kino.Mail and others . Communication platform “Other Rules” . In the beginning of 2017 , the operator presented a new communication strategy for 2017—2021 . The new concept involves an emphasis on innovative products that reflect the preferences of subscribers and support their lifestyle , and on excellent customer . The launch of the strategy was accompanied by the change of the corporate identity and slogan of the company . The new slogan sounds like “Tele2 . Other rules” . New opportunities were announced at the strategy presentation : possibility to transfer the unused minutes and internet traffic to the next month . This new feature , unique for the Russian market , demonstrates the ideology of the new platform creating visibility and advantages for subscribers . In October 2017 , also first-ever on the Russian communications market , an additional feature was introduced – exchange of minutes to gigabytes . On September 25 , 2019 , Tele2 Russia launched one-of-a-kind on the Russian telecom-market platform ‘Tele2 Exchange’ . This service allows subscribers from all over the country to post offers for sale of unemployed minutes and Gigabytes from their plan package and backward to buy them from a number of lots posted at the Exchange . The money from the sales goes to the mobile account and the subscriber can spend it to pay for the telecom services . Within the first month after the launch the service was used by 2.5 million people . eSIM . On April 29 , 2019 Tele2 was the first in Russia to present an opportunity to switch over to eSIM in Moscow and Moscow region . - In April 2019 , MTS , Megafon and Beeline made a stand against adoption of eSIM in Russia . On May 14 , 2019 , at the decision of the Ministry of Digital Development , Communications and Mass Media ( Minkomsvyaz ) , the release of Tele2 Russia eSim was suspended . On 20 September 2019 , the Ministry lifted the ban . 5G . In August 2019 , Tele2 Russia in association with Ericsson launched the first in Russia pilot 5G zone in Tverskaya Street in Moscow providing full outdoor coverage from the Kremlin to the Garden Ring . The pilot 5G zone operates in the 28 GHz band in NSA ( Non-standalone ) mode , which allows deployment of 5G in LTE networks and simplifies the implementation of the latest standard at the initial stage . On August 23 , 2019 , the company performed testing of subscriber equipment in the pilot 5G network . The device based on Qualcomm® mobile platform Snapdragon™ demonstrated a peak throughput of about 2.1 Gbit/s and a minimum latency of 9 msec . In October 2019 , the company launched cloud games in the flagship store in Tverskaya street in Moscow to show the difference in the quality of gaming when connected to 4G and 5G networks . The game runs on a remote server , only the picture is transmitted to the users device . During the cloud game in 5G network the company achieved the speed of more than 1 Gbit/s with a latency of 5 msec . February 17 , 2020 Tele2 conducted the first live broadcast on 5G networks in the urban environment in Russia . The live-stream was broadcast by Sony Xperia 5G device outdoors , on Tverskaya Street and Theater Square , in conditions of heavy traffic . During the tests , Sony mobile terminal based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon 855 chip and Qualcomm Snapdragon X50 modem provided a stable connection . On August 15 , 2020 , Tele2 in association with a Swiss mobile operator Sunrise Tele2 launched 5G service for Russian subscribers arriving to Switzerland . The smartphones with fifth generation network support connect the 5G automatically when roaming . “MVNO Factory” . In 2016 Tele2 Russia started to create mobile virtual network operators ( MVNOs ) – the operators which do not have their own infrastructure and therefore use the network of another mobile operator . It is usually established by businesses with extensive client base for providing mobile services to customers on their own account . By November 2017 , there were more than 10 MNVOs ( most of them in Russia ) on the basis of Tele2 , of these , Rostelecom , Sberbank , Multiregional TransitTelecom , Tinkoff Bank . In November , the company launched their own MVNE-platform ( mobile virtual network enabler ) , a set of standard systems , including billing , CRM , analytics tools and other components necessary for the work of MVNOs . With this platform , Tele2 Russia announced intention to streamline launching of MNVOs and create dozens of them each year . The company named this strategy “MNVO Factory” . Within 2018 , the number of Tele2-based MVNO subscribers increased by 75% to 1.75 million people . According to the results of 2019 , there are more than 20 Tele2-based MNVOs ( the majority of them in Russia ) , including Rostelecom , Sbermobile , , Tinkoff Mobile , VTB Mobile . Their subscriber base reckons 3,75 million people , compared with last year , this figure increased by 115% . Corporate responsibility . In 2019 , Tele 2 launched the Pereplavka environmental project aimed at sensibilization of the necessity to process e-waste . Over the 3 weeks of the campaign , customers from 11 regions of Russia brought 1217 old mobile gadgets for processing . In October 2020 , Tele2 scaled the project up and set special boxes for e-waste in 579 brand stores in 60 regions of Russia . All the gadgets are sent to “Ecopolis” which the only complex of e-waste recycling factories in Russia . External links . - Tele2 Russia Website ( English )