A press conference dedicated to summing up the results of activity of Unitel LLC, second largest mobile operator providing mobile services in Uzbekistan under Beeline brand, was held at Dedeman Silk Road Tashkent hotel on 26 October.

The meeting of Unitel management with journalists had two reasons: 10 years ago the company started its operation in Uzbekistan, and 1 year ago the company launched its Beeline brand in the country, UzReport.com reported.

Branches have been created in all regions of Uzbekistan in the past year and now Beeline sales and service offices are working in all regional centres. "This process passed rather dynamically and we managed to solve this task," said Evgeniy Ruban, Director General of Unitel.

The second task solved is development of trading network. The trading network of Unitel was virtually only in Tashkent one year ago. Today there are dealers, trading points in all cities and they are selling scratch and SIM cards. "Our aim is to make so that the clients leaving home could buy necessary services at the nearest point. We haven’t solved this task yet, but we are very close to its solution", Ruban noted.

At the same time, the head of Unitel believes that people are the main resource in operation, as hardware can be purchased, but competent specialists are needed to handle it. That is why the past year was devoted to staff training. Thus, more than 1,000 people have passed trainings, which almost twice exceed the number of the company’s employees. So, virtually every employee has passed two or three trainings per year.

"It is very serious, especially since our specialists trained abroad – in Belgium and Russia. The purpose is to gain knowledge and experience in the work with new services and technologies," the head of Unitel said.

Besides, several charity events were organized this year, and sponsorship was targeted at such spheres, as education, medicine and culture. For example, concert performances of Russian actors in June this year had a success in Tashkent, Samarkand, Zarafshan and Uchkuduk.

"Last year a few people in Uzbekistan saw and knew Beeline brand, but today, I think, everyone can recognize us," Ruban concluded.

Commercial Director of Unitel Evgeniy Skripnik told in details about the company’s achievements since the launch of Beeline brand in Uzbekistan. He said the number of subscribers made up over 1.63 million as of 1 October 2007, which is nearly 3 times more compared to the similar period of 2006. The increase of subscribers resulted in growth of market share by 9.2%, which has reached 35.6%.

The number of base stations has grown by approximately 70% since September 2006 and the service network of Beeline subscribers expanded significantly as a result. "Next year we are expecting almost the same growth rates," Skripnik said.

Speaking of the future tasks and plans, the Unitel management did not disclose figures, names of concrete services and dates of their launch. Explaining that they said: "Beeline is a public company and therefore we cannot disclose commercial plans. The other reason is that the shares of our company are quoted at the New York Stock Exchange, which envisages observance of strict rules on information disclosure".

Evgeniy Skripnik just said that Beeline would continue making its current clients happy and doing its best so that potential clients could find positive emotions of using its services.