(, for the northern part of
Argentina , including half of the
Buenos Aires city. Briefly known as '''Sociedad Licenciataria Norte S.A.''', it quickly changed its name, and is usually known as simply '''Telecom''' within Argentina.
Telecom Argentina's local telephone market, together with
Telefónica De Argentina on the southern part of the country, was a
Monopoly until
1999 -
10-08 . Telecom also operates
Mobile Phone service ''Personal'' and
Internet Service Provider ''Arnet''.
,
Buenos Aires .]]
In 1990, Argentina started to was given the "upper half" of the country, from the middle to the north, and
Telefónica was given the southern part. Each company was given an initial 7 year monopoly beginning on
1990 -
11-08 . Initially other companies were given exclusive licenses for International long distance and cellular phone service also.
Both local phone companies turned their systems into profitable operations in just a few years, despite the terrible conditions they inherited from ENTel. In the worst years of ENTel, a line activation would take several years. The telephone wiring layout across the country was undocumented. At privatization in 1990, the wait was still 4 years to get new service and 40 days for repair. (See
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Starting off with severe downsizings, Telecom Argentina started to invest into the country, but there was little outside capital investment; rather, a small portion of earnings were reinvested. Years later, all of the phone network was upgraded to a state-of-the-art system, from central
Telephone Exchange s up to the wires going into homes; by 2005, 98% of the ENTel network infrastructure had been replaced. Finally, the dream of many people, having their own phone line, was a reality.
Unlike many other privatized companies, Telecom got a totally degraded and inefficient company and turned it into a working, profitable company. In contrast, the train lines (which cost the state roughly US$1,000,000 ''per day'' in losses to operate 30,000 km of railroads), were sold to private corporations, it still cost the state US$1,000,000 per day in subsidies to operate 1,400km of railroads.
In 2005, the
Bank Of New York was appointed as trustee, registrar and paying and transfer agent for Telecom Argentina's $1.5 billion
Debt Restructuring . "The transaction was Argentina's largest corporate debt restructuring to date", according to the Bank of New York November 3, 2005 press release. The restructure involved the exchange of $2.8 billion in outstanding debt for newly issued exchange notes and cash; "As the
Settlement agent in the transaction, The Bank of New York received and processed electronic and manual instructions from investors holding bonds in
Euroclear ,
Clearstream , the
Depository Trust Corporation (DTC), and from creditors holding debt in physical form."
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Critics of Telecom argue that, when it received government subsidies to provide service in remote areas, it either didn't provide the service, or just installed
Public Telephone s. Critics also point to the high prices charged by the company, and to the fact that, unlike much of the world, Argentine customers have to pay per minute, rather than a fixed price.
In contrast, defendants of the system point out that the 011 area code (called AMBA, most of
Gran Buenos Aires ) provides local phone access to five to six million users (15-16% of the total population of the country), making a flat-rate type of service economically impossible.
Due to the lack of long requested flat telephone rates for local calls, specially to connect to
Internet , a lot of users installed
ADSL services from Arnet, Telecom's
Internet Service Provider . The company was heavily criticised when it decided to limit
ADSL users to 4 GB per month and charge for extra traffic, a decision which was promptly reversed.
Other critics to the company are centred on the lack of information on their offers, and obscure contracts with prices not including taxes, and other important information.
France Télécom sold its part of the company to the Argentinian
Werthein Group . As of 2007, current approximate ownership of Telecom Argentina is
Estructura del capital , Telecom Argentina.:
- 54,74% by Nortel Inversora S.A., itself a consortium made up of:
- ---Werthein Group (48%)
- --- Telecom Italia group (50%)
- --- France Télécom group (2%)
- 41,5% publicly traded
- 4,21% employee stock ownership program
