Etihad Etisalat (Mobily), the second mobile service provider in the Kingdom, plans to invest SR22 billion in the next five years to enhance products and services, CEO Khalid Al-Kaf said.

Al-Kaf, in a wide ranging interview with Al-Eqtisadiah newspaper, affirmed that the company has used to invest SR4 billion-SR4.5 billion annually since its inception (2004) and thus bringing the volume of investments between SR54-58 billion in 13 years.

According to him, Mobily retains more than 40 percent of the Kingdom’s mobile market share.

Mobily currently covers 92 percent of the Kingdom’s areas with the 3rd generation services and 45 cities with the 4th generation, he was quoted as saying.

Mobily also retains the lion’s share in the area of broad-band services in the Kingdom where some 450,000 houses and firms have recently connected with fixed broad-band services, he said.

He affirmed that Saudi telecom market can absorb another fourth telecom operator on condition that the price of license be affordable and it provides new and competitive services.

The Mobily chief said the telecom sector will witness a remarkable development in the next few years when two systems, namely cloud computing and broad-band services , become widely used, notably when the fourth and fifth generations are applied.

Although the systems are in the early stages of application, they are however widely used in North America, East Asia, Korea, and Japan, but Europe is lagging behind for hesitance to take proper decisions on the spread of broad-band services, he said.

Referring to services and products in the telecom sector, Al-Kaf said call servicers are capturing the biggest proportion of the sector activities but data services will make balance in a three-year period. All firms, including press houses or banks, will depend on the information technology (IT) as a base for their business, he said.

On how to expand the fixed broad-band services in the Kingdom, the Mobily chief said the Communication and Information Technology Commission (CITC) is playing a constructive role in this regard. The more growth of all types of broad-band, there will be an increase in revenues and growth in the Kingdom’s gross domestic product (GDP), he said hoping that the penetration rate of the broad-band services will range 40-60 percent in the Kingdom.

On the Saudi manpower in the company, he said Saudis constitute 86 percent of the company’s employees.

He added that the Saudi telecom regulation is the best model in the Middle East, which is easily readable and applicable by the telecom operators. However, there is room for its development in the long term, he said.

Touching on the financial side, the Mobily chief said the company is capable of achieving good profits for stockholders and investors.

Mobily achieved profits of SR6 billion by the end of 2012 compared to SR5.1 billion in 2011, or an increase of 18 percent.

The Mobily chief appreciated the comprehensive service fund (CSF), which is originally concerned with the remote (and least developed) areas where the government provides infrastructure services and offers suitable prices to local operators. The fund will cover many parts of the Kingdom, he said.