Cairo - Mubasher: VimpelCom and Global Telecom Holding, together with Warid Telecom Pakistan LLC and Bank Alfalah Limited have reached an agreement to merge their Pakistan telecom businesses.

The merger of Pakistan Mobile Communications Limited (Mobilink) and Warid Telecom (Warid) will create a combined entity serving 45 million customers.  

The transaction is the first merger in the mobile telecommunications sector in Pakistan.

Together with continued investments, the new entity will allow Mobilink and Warid to accelerate the availability of high-speed mobile telecommunications and provide consumers and businesses with a best-in-class mobile network, more competitively priced services and wider access to enablement facilities such as mobile financial services, according to the company’s statement.

The transaction is expected to create Capex and Opex synergies with a net present value of approximately $500 million.

The combined revenue of both companies for the 12 months to September 2015 was $1.4 billion.