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Batelco

Batelco Overview

Bahrain Telecommunication Company, trading as Batelco, is Bahrain’s main telecommunications company.

Established in 1981, Batelco provides mobile services and is one of Bahrain’s five internet providers.

Batelco’s major shareholders include Orascom Investment Holding, which holds 60 percent, and the government of Bahrain through Mumtalakat Holding Company, Amber Holding Company and Social Insurance Organisation.

Various financial and commercial organisations and private Bahraini, GCC countries and international investors hold the remaining shares.

Batelco operates other services including IT solutions and software as a service under the Beyon brand.

Bahrain is among the first countries to have a comprehensive 5G network coverage in most urban areas, with more than 95 percent coverage courtesy of Batelco, Saudi Arabia’s STC and Kuwait’s Zain.

Batelco News

Bahrain Bourse hopes traders will be encouraged by discounts on commissions

Bahrain bourse launches incentive scheme to revive trading

Bahrain Bourse will introduce various incentives next month to try to boost trading on a market that accounts for less than one-thousandth of daily turnover on Gulf stock exchanges. The scheme, which begins on February 2, aims to improve trading activity and increase the number of institutions investing in Bahraini stocks. Its launch comes amid […]

Bahrain airport city

Bahrain to tender for ‘airport city’ in early 2025

Bahrain will issue tenders early next year to build a new “airport city” based around the existing Bahrain International Airport. The project will include commercial and residential development, according to Mohamed Yousif AlBinfalah, CEO of Bahrain Airport Company. “We have a significant amount of space that will be coming to the market soon for development,” […]

Bahrain's Minister of Finance and National Economy, Sheikh Salman bin Khalifa al-Khalifa speaks during a financial conference in Manama, Bahrain February 27, 2019. REUTERS/Hamad I Mohammed

Bahrain’s Mumtalakat prizes local investment over global

Bahrain’s multi-billion dollar sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat is looking closer to home for investments, prioritising local over international opportunities. Shaikh Salman bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, minister of finance and national economy at Mumtalakat, said: “What we have found is the most compelling investment opportunities, the highest return on equity investments, are increasingly at home or […]

Gulf companies returned an average dividend yield of 3.5% and the majority to declare returns for Q2 have been Saudi

Saudi blue-chips help Gulf dividends dwarf global average

Saudi companies form the bulk of Gulf businesses that have announced second quarter dividends, but it is the Commercial Bank of Kuwait that provided the highest dividend yield. Saudi Aramco, Bahrain’s Batelco and Dubai’s Tecom Group are other standouts by this metric.  Of the listed Gulf companies with a market capitalisation of more than $1 […]

People walk through the souk in Manama, Bahrain; FDI has been encouraged by the golden licence programme for investors

Bahrain attracts a record $6.8bn in foreign investment

Bahrain has set a new record by attracting $6.8 billion in foreign direct investment (FDI) in 2023. This is a 148 percent increase from the previous year’s $2.8 billion, according to the latest World Investment Report by the UN Conference on Trade and Development. Kuwait emerged as the top contributor, accounting for 36 percent of […]

6G tech

Batelco in talks to trial 6G technology in Bahrain

Bahrain telecommunications giant Batelco is in talks to trial 6th generation (6G) connectivity as the kingdom attempts to cement its position as a technological leader in the region. The island kingdom is among the first countries to have a comprehensive 5G network coverage in most urban areas, with more than 95 percent coverage courtesy of […]

Bahrain digital

Bahrain’s Beyon puts $250m into digital infrastructure 

Tech company Beyon Group is investing more than $250 million in new infrastructure to support Bahrain’s digital transformation. The parent company of telecoms operator Batelco said it has joined the Southeast Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 6 (SEA-ME-WE 6) consortium, which is building a 21,700km-long undersea telecommunications cable from Marseille in France to Singapore. The cable will […]

Osman Sultan

Osman Sultan on Mena’s move from ‘telco’ to ‘techco’

Osman Sultan proclaimed in 1997 he would put “a mobile in the hand of everyone” in Egypt. At the time, even some shareholders at Egyptian Company for Mobile Services (MobiNil), where he was CEO, were unsettled by his audacious statement.  Egypt’s telecoms regulator granted him a licence to become the country’s first mobile operator, but […]