JEDDAH, 1 September — The Saudi Telecom Company’s sales for this year are expected to be worth more than SR20 billion, Al-Watan Arabic newspaper reported yesterday quoting STC President Khaled Al-Mulhem.
The telecom giant’s sales have increased tremendously during the past years, from SR9 billion in 1998 to SR14.5 billion in 1999 and SR17 billion last year.
“This year’s sales are expected to exceed SR20 billion,” the president said.
Al-Mulhem said the company’s mobile service now covers 95 percent of residential areas and main roads.
“We will cover the remaining areas within 12 months,” he told the Arabic daily.
Mobile phone sales have gone up by eight to 10 percent monthly since last May, with the total number of mobile phones now put at more than 2.5 million.
Mulhem disclosed a plan to establish 450,000 new land phones within 18 months. The company has already signed contracts with two international firms to add about 1.2 million new mobile phone lines to the country’s existing network.
The STC president denied reports that expatriates require approval from sponsors and financial guarantees before they can be given family mobile phones.
The company also clarified yesterday that no free calls are allowed when using mobile phones. It was responding to rumors that free calls could be made with mobiles by using a code before dialing.
However, the source admitted that people may have used the codes (that are usually used for the maintenance of the network) to make calls.
In a related development, the issuance of a single secret number for all pager phones by the company at the time of subscription has caused difficulty for clients trying to control incoming and outgoing messages.
Fahd Al-Eisa, director of the mobile phone service at STC, told Arab News that clients should have changed the code number after receiving the pager connection. The company issues all new pager phones with the initial code number 1234.
Pager phone subscribers complained that the confusion had been exploited by certain groups or individuals to send unwelcome messages, causing frustration and annoyance.
