Jump to content

Eurotel

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Khajidha (talk | contribs) at 15:41, 30 March 2017. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Eurotel Bratislava logo
Old Eurotel CZ logo, used in Czech Republic until 2001
New Eurotel CZ logo, used in Czech Republic from 2001 to 2006

Eurotel is the name of a former mobile network, acquired and transformed into a branch of T-Mobile in Slovakia and O2 in the Czech republic.

Eurotel was founded in 1990 as a joint venture between SPT Telecom (51%) and the American joint venture Atlantic West (initially between US WEST International, Inc. and Bell Atlantic International Inc.; later acquired by AT&T Wireless and Verizon). At launch, it received an exclusive five-year licence to operate a public data network and a 20-year licence for the 450 MHz band to operate an analogue NMT mobile phone network and also, automatically, a right to buy a licence to the future GSM network.

The name Eurotel was used for the Czechoslovak network. After the country's division in 1993, the company also separated into a Slovak Eurotel Bratislava and a Czech Eurotel Praha. The Slovak branch was rebranded to Telekom (formerly T-mobile) in 2005, the Czech branch to O2 in 2006.

O2 also operates in Slovakia and T-Mobile in the Czech republic, but they are unrelated to either Eurotel Bratislava or Eurotel Praha, respectively. Telefónica O2 Slovakia is a brand new network and T-Mobile Czech Republic evolved from the Paegas network.

In March 2000, EuroTel successfully closed a Euro 175 million high yield bond offering, and became one of the first companies in Central Europe to access the public capital markets and become an S.E.C registrant.[citation needed]