Ericsson will ensure maintenance and operation of Romtelecom and Cosmote networks

Romtelecom and Cosmote signed a 7 year contract with Ericsson for integrated support services for operation and maintenance of the network. The Swedish company will take over 730 employees from the two telecommunication operators. Passive network maintenance units and the monitoring and operation of the fix and mobile networks will be transferred to Ericsson Romania, Romtelecom announced in a press release.

2014-07-08 14:51:55

The Swedish company was selected by tender in which important local and foreign telecommunication players participated."About 730 employees from Romtelecom and Cosmote teams will join Ericsson Global Services in the next period of time," the press release says.

According to sources from the telecommunications market, Alcatel Lucent and Huawei local subsidies also participated in the tender.

The seven year contract stipulates that Ericsson will take over responsibilities for the operation and maintenance of fix and mobile networks, transmission, domains core and IP as well as the operation of networks for operation support systems from Romtelecom and Cosmote Romania.

"Romania is a very important market for Ericsson and that is why it hosts one of four Global Service Centers. This accord will allow us to know the Romanian market and will support operators to improve network quality, the quality of services in general, in order to encourage loyalty among end users," said Jean Claude Geha, vicepresident and head of Managed Services Ericsson.
Ericssson Global Service Centers, located in China, India, Mexico and Romania, host global operation centers which in collaboration with local and regional centers offer integrated support services for networks serving 1 billion subscribers.

Global Service Centrals also develop competences to back regional organization in delivering professional services for IT and communications as well and consulting, IT, system integration, network implementation and customer support.

The present contract extends the partnership between Ericsson and Romania. At the end of 2009, Romtelecom announced that it would transfer about 400 employees from Commutation and Electric supply departments as of January 11, 2010, for a period of 5 years.

Romtelecom is one of the biggest local telecommunications operators and is owned by OTE -54.01 per cent and the Ministry for Information Society-44.99 per cent. The German group Deutsche Telekom owns 40 per cent of OTE Group.

Last year, Romtelecom reported overall incomes of 609.5 million euro, on the drop by 1.6 per cent against 2012. The operational profit before interest rates, taxes, depreciation was 147.7 million euro, on the drop by 11.1 per cent against 2012.

Cosmote Romania is the third player in the mobile phone market, after Orange Romania and Vodafone Romania.In 2013, incomes dropped by 0.9 per cent to 458.5 million euro. The pro forma operational profit was 119 million euro, 1 per cent lower than in 2012.The mobile operator is owned by Cosmote Group, a part of OTE Group -70 per cent and Romtelecom -30 per cent.

The local branch of the Swedish company Ericsson had over 1,400 employees and businesses of 543.7 million lei in 2011, according to data supplied by the Ministry of Public Finance.