BELGRADE: Austrian, Egyptian and Norwegian companies won the right Wednesday to bid for Serbia s biggest mobile telecoms operator at an auction later this month, the government said. The three are Mobilkom Austria, Orascom Telecom and Telenor. They were selected from a list of 10 companies that had applied to buy a 70-percent stake in Mobi 63, the privatization agency said in a statement. Among the telecommunications companies losing out were France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom, as well as firms from Abu Dhabi, Israel, Russia and two from Sweden. The stake sale of Mobi 63, which was formerly named Mobtel, is to be conducted on July 31, with the winner getting a 10-year renewable operating license, the agency said. Mobtel was set up in 1994 by Bogoljub Karic, a tycoon who amassed his fortune during the era of late former Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic. But the Serbian government revoked its license in December, citing alleged illegal deals in the UN-run Serbian province of Kosovo. The company, which has an estimated two million subscribers, has since been run by the state operator Telekom Srbija. The Austrian investment group Holdenhurst, which owns the remaining 30-percent stake in Mobi 63, could also sell its share.
