PPF Telecom Group has sold 100 percent of shares in Telenor Montenegro to Hungarian 4iG. Completion of the sale is subject to approval by the regulator in Montenegro and its settlement is expected by the end of this year. PPF stated this in a press release. Both parties have agreed not to disclose the price.
“Our business strategy is focused on markets with significant growth potential and a certain weight within our portfolio. We therefore decided to sell Telenor Montenegro to a company that has a long-term interest in further developing the mobile operator,” said PPF Telecom Group CEO Marek String.
Telenor Montenegro has 333,000 subscribers and last year achieved sales of 44 million euros (CZK 1.1 billion). Last year, the Montenegrin market accounted for 1.1 percent of PPF Telecom Group’s operating profit.
According to Sláčík, one of Telenor Černá Hora’s main competitive advantages is its employees. The local team manages to keep the operator in the first place according to the volume of sales. Telenor also operates a mobile network, which was evaluated as the best in Montenegro in an independent measurement.
PPF Group acquired Telenor’s telecommunications operators in Bulgaria, Montenegro, Hungary and Serbia in July 2018. The acquisition led to the creation of PPF Group’s telecommunications division under the name PPF Telecom Group. The group has 18.3 million customers and 12,000 employees in eight countries, with operating EBITDA of € 1.4 billion in fiscal year 2020.
PPF Telecom was the first in Europe to perform a structural separation into two main segments: the telecommunications services division, which provides services to end users, and the infrastructure division, which owns and operates telecommunications infrastructure on a wholesale basis.
4iG Nyrt. is one of the largest IT companies on the Hungarian market. The company provides system integration services, managed IT services or outsourcing of IT operations and is traded on the Budapest Stock Exchange. 4iG plans to diversify its existing portfolio of services and enter new markets in the region of Central and Eastern Europe.