The Kyivstar mobile communications operator from July 1, 2018 launched 4G (LTE) mobile Internet in the 1800 MHz band in Kyiv, and then with intervals of two days it will be launched in Odesa, Lviv and other regions, Kyivstar President Peter Chernyshov told reporters at a meeting in Lviv.
“Starting July 1, we are launching 4G in the 1800 MHz band. These are additional frequencies that will make broad coverage. Our competitors want to announce in a beautiful way that they are launching immediately and everywhere. We have another strategy: we want everything to work well. There are a lot of towers in Kyiv, and we want us to have two days to check how it works, and if everything works well, then on July 3 we start in Odesa and the resorts, and on July 5 – in Lviv and the suburbs,” he said.
Chernyshov also said that in the event that something will not work perfectly – the company plans to postpone the dates of subsequent launches until troubleshooting is finished.
At the same time, the operator’s president said that Kyivstar does not have any problems with the General Staff of the Armed Forces or receiving approved documents.
As reported, lifecell on July 1 will launch 4.5G (LTE Advanced Pro) mobile Internet in the 1800 MHz band in 232 cities and towns in Ukraine.
The Kyivstar mobile operator plans to launch an application for own Smart Money financial service within one month, Head of the mobile financial services department of the operator Taras Horkun has said. “We originally designed our financial services in a way that we could cover those cities and towns where the bank network is poorly represented. We have the opportunity of creating financial services that can be managed via SMS messages not only from smartphones, but also from button phones,” he told journalists at a meeting in Lviv on June 29.
According to Horkun, now the service is undergoing the latest testing, and if the testing is successful at all stages – within a month the application should appear in the markets.
He said that Smart Money from Kyivstar is not a competitor of the banking system, since the application includes services that the operator launches together with banks, in particular, Ukrgasbank and Pravex-Bank, and there are certain segments that are represented by other banks.
“We are open and we cooperate with different payment systems and various banks. Our electronic money is the money of the Prostir system of the National Bank. We consider ourselves as part of building a national program for establishing Cashless Economy in Ukraine,” Horkun said.
The Kyivstar mobile communications operator with support of the Agricultural Policy and Food Ministry of Ukraine has launched m-Agri mobile application for small farms, the company has said in a press release.
“The business application should provide farmers with access to best practices, knowledge base, industry price proposals, news, training resources and online consultations, as well as to bring farmers to new markets to sell their products and provide them with opportunities to grow their business,” the operator said.
Currently, seven basic sections are available in the application: news, market prices, weather, finance, knowledge base, Smart Assistant and messages.
In the future, it is planned to supplement the functionality of the platform with financial services, a trading platform, and other things.
The application is designed for mobile devices on the Android system. It is free of charge for Kyivstar users.
On Google Play the application is a free trial version.
The mobile communications operator Kyivstar saw a 10.1% rise in total revenue in January-March 2018 year-over-year, to UAH 4.263 billion, according to a financial report of the company’s shareholder – Veon international group (before the rebranding it was VimpelCom Ltd.) posted on its official website. According to the report, during this period, Kyivstar increased earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) by 16.4% compared to the same period in 2016, to UAH 2.412 billion. The EBITDA margin increased 3 percentage points (p.p.), to 56.6%.
Revenue from mobile operator services for the first three months of 2018 amounted to UAH 3.968 billion, an 11% increase over the same period in 2017, which is explained by the growth in both the number of mobile Internet users (by 1.6 million) and their mobile data use (average consumption of mobile data traffic per month increased by 121%, to 1.5 GB per subscriber).
At the same time, revenue from mobile Internet for the year increased by almost 59%. Its share was 33% of total revenue from mobile communications. The number of mobile subscribers of Kyivstar in January-March 2018 increased 1.9% to 26.5 million. The minutes of use (MoU) grew by 2.1%, to 586 minutes. The average revenue per user (ARPU) rose by 8.5%, to UAH 49 per month.
Revenue of the mobile operator from fixed-line communications remained unchanged in the first quarter of 2018, being UAH 295 million. The number of fixed-line Internet users slightly grew – by 2.7%, to some 800,000 users, and ARPU from fixed-line Internet grew by 4.3%, to UAH 72.
Capital investment over the period fell by 6.8% (not taking into account the cost of 4G licenses), reaching UAH 687 million.
According to the report, the operator continued to deploy its 3G network in the first quarter, expanding its coverage of the area with the 3G network from 64% in the first quarter of 2017 to 74% in the first quarter of 2018. In April 2018, the company began to provide communication services in the 4G (LTE) standard. In the first quarter of 2018, Kyivstar transferred more than UAH 2.9 billion taxes and duties to the national budget of Ukraine.
Subscribers of the largest Ukrainian mobile communications operator Kyivstar speak 589 minutes on average on cell phones, and average voice calls in the European Union (EU) amount to 200 minutes a month, President of Kyivstar Peter Chernyshov wrote on his Facebook page. He said that Ukrainians on average use mobile phone more and pay less.
“According to GSMА Intelligence, in 2017, subscribers in the EU used 200 minutes a month on average. The average revenue per user (ARPU) was UAH 267 ($13.72). Each subscriber of the Kyivstar network used 589 minutes a month on average with ARPU of UAH 49 ($1.8),” Chernyshov said.
He also said that a Frenchman or a Portuguese used near 3 gigabytes of data traffic a month in 2017, and a Ukrainian used 1 gigabyte. The president of Kyivstar believes that after the full launch of 4G communication in Ukraine the situation would change and Ukrainians would use mobile Internet more actively.
The 4G communications tender for the 1800 MHz band on March 6 was held honestly, professionally and openly, fully in line with the Ukrainian legislation, President of the largest Ukrainian mobile communications operator Kyivstar Petro Chernyshov has said. “We are thankful for support of authorities in holding the successful tender, in particular, the president of Ukraine. I regret about my previous comments. I had no intention to criticize the tender process,” he said in a statement published on Wednesday.
Earlier on Wednesday, an interview of on March 6 was published. He criticized the fact that Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko spoke at the tender between the session for the second and third lots.
In the new statement, the Kyivstar president pointed out concerted efforts of all power institutions, the regulator and the government during the entire period of preparations and holding the 4G tenders for 1800 MHz and 2600 MHz to make them successful.
Chernyshov recalled that the company invested over UAH 14 billion in the development of new technologies in Ukraine and seeks to expand its presence in the sphere, in particular, to install over 600 additional towers in 2018 to expand the 4G coverage territory on the major part of Ukraine, including in rural areas.
Kyivstar highly appreciates the potential of 4G development in Ukraine and believes that access to new technologies became possible thanks to the holding of the successful and transparent 4G tender for radio frequencies.
