Qatar Telecom willing to up stake in Liberty Telecom

MANILA, Philippines - Qatar Telecom QSC (Qtel) announced they are willing to increase their stake in San Miguel owned Liberty Telecommunications Inc to 40 percent or the maximum level allowed by the law.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the 36th Philippine Business Conference (PBC) at the Manila Hotel yesterday, Qatar Telecom chairman Sheikh Abdullah Bin Saud Al Thani said that they would like to buy more shares of Liberty.

Currently, Qatar has 33 percent of Liberty’s outstanding shares. This involves 426.8 million shares. “There is nothing stopping us from investing,” Al Thani said, adding that “we are extremely happy to be in the Philippines.”

Al Thani said that San Miguel has been a good partner to them. “We are exploring more business with San Miguel.”

When asked if they would like to partner with other Filipino firms, Al Thani said that there is no exclusivity with their contract with San Miguel. “We look at the opportunity and we go with it.”

In 2008, San Miguel and state-controlled Qtel entered into a deal to venture into wireless broadband and mobile phone services in the Philippines using Liberty as a vehicle. Qtel has been expanding rapidly outside its home market, aiming to join the ranks of the world’s top 20 telecoms firms by 2020.

During his speech at the PBC, Al Thani expressed his confidence in the country’s business environment. “For companies here in the Philippines, the opportunities for growth are significant. Yours is a forward looking nation, and increasingly the center of global economic gravity is shifting from the West to the East,” Al Thani said.

“By working together, companies in the Middle East and the Philippines have enormous opportunity,” he added.

Al Thani said that the pace of growth in emerging markets will overtake that of the mature markets, making Asia more important than ever.

“Investors should be confident in the potential of the Philippine economy,” he stressed.

Qtel, through its wi-tribe brand, already supports broadband wireless services in the emerging markets. The wi-tribe provides Wi-MAX services in Jordan and is in the process of launching new offerings in Pakistan.