During the 2008–2009 crisis, Russia’s VimpelCom underinvested in networks and in 2010 lost second place in mobile revenue to MegaFon. After the crisis ended, the company did not immediately return to the pre-crisis level of capital investment (which exceeded 20%): in 2010, investments in Russia amounted to 19% of revenue, and for the first nine months of 2011 – 18%. For MegaFon, this figure for the same periods was 31 and 26%, respectively. MTS’s Russian capital investment in 2010 amounted to 24% of revenue, and in 2011 it plans to maintain it at 22–24%.

Russian 40%. 4.8

billion dollars were invested by Vimpelcom in the year ending September 30, 2010 (including Wind Telecom). $1.94 billion went to Russia

Vimpelcom Ltd.

A group of mobile and fixed-line operators. Shareholders: Naguib Sawiris (29.6% of voting shares), Telenor (25%), Altimo (24.998%), Oleg Kiselev (5.995%), 14.4% traded on the NYSE. Capitalization – $18.1 billion, revenue (US GAAP, 2010) – $21.83 billion, net profit – $909 million.

By the end of 2014, Vimpelcom plans to reduce the ratio of capital investments excluding the cost of licenses and frequencies to revenue from the current 21% (for the last 12 reporting months) to less than 15%. This is stated in the holding's materials for investors.

Vimpelcom will not reduce construction, but intends to invest more efficiently, explains its representative Elena Prokhorova. In particular, to negotiate with operators on joint use of networks and infrastructure, joint construction of the transport network, and also to outsource some equipment. In addition, Vimpelcom is already saving on equipment purchases thanks to the merger with Wind Telecom; taking into account the contracts concluded since then, the group has already achieved a reduction in expenses by $1.9 billion, its CEO Joe Lunder said the other day.

Vimpelcom is to build an LTE network in Italy (licenses were won in September 2011), and possibly in Russia (competitions will be held in the first quarter of 2012). The construction of the Italian LTE network will not greatly change the ratio of capital investments and revenues in Italy (in 2010 – 16.3%): the network will be built mainly on the existing infrastructure, says Prokhorova.

MTS is already negotiating the joint use of infrastructure, in particular with VimpelCom, Megafon, and FSK, recalls its representative Valeria Kuzmenko.

Vimpelcom decided to save money