$2.7b Invested in MCI in Five Years

Head of the Mobile Telecommunication Company of Iran (locally known as Hamrahe Aval) said at the company’s general assembly meeting that MCI has attracted 103 trillion rials ($2.7 billion) investment over the past five years.

Vahid Sadoghi said in the last fiscal (ended March 20), MCI registered its largest growth rate, local technology news website, ICTNA reported.

In the past year “The growth was 2% over the rate in the previous year.”

On a visibly optimistic note he added, “The company is set to triple its investments in the coming years.”

Sadoghi claimed, “MCI sold 12.4 million SIMs during the [12-month] period,” this is while the company’s average annual sales during the previous five years were 740,000.

The company chief did provide some basic information about MCI revenues but was not generous with real numbers.

According to Sadoghi, the company’s main source of income has been from voice calls up until now, “but MCI saw falling demand for the service in the last fiscal. But for the first time during the period Internet services became profitable.”

In the past Internet services did not return the costs of the expansion and maintenance, but last year MCI recorded positive revenues in this realm, the told the meeting.

With the rise in number of Iranians using smartphones, demand for mobile Internet services has observed significant growth in recent years

Likewise, the number of Iranians with access to the Internet during the one year period increased 17.5% with 53.2% of the population currently on the web. By the end of the previous year 45.3% of the population used the Internet.

The CEO also addressed the issue of Telegram voice calls. Telegram messenger is the most popular communications app in Iran. On April 13, Telegram’s voice call service was launched in Iran only to be blocked hours later by the judiciary.

“MCI has nothing to do with the service being blocked in Iran. It was the judiciary’s decision.”

The judiciary’s official claim is that it was due to “security reasons.”