Welcome to the Celtnet Telecommunications History of Vodafone Page Here you will find information about the history

y and evolution of Vodafone as a company, how it started and how the company has evolved and changed over the years. Vodafone is the largest mobile telecommunications network company (as measured by turnover) and has a market value of about 86 billion. It is headquartered in Newbury, Berkshire, England. As of January 2007 Vodafone had 200 million customers in 27 markets worldwide. In terms of customers, therefore, only China Mobile is larger. The company was founded in 1982 as a joint venture and the name was derived from the newlyfound company's goal of establishing both voice (VO) and data (DA) services over a mobile telephone network. Vodafone Information Page Welcome to the new home page of the Celtnet Telecommunications Companies information site. This page provides you with information on the origins and activities of the company, Vodafone.

History

Company Beginnings

Original Corporate Logo of Vodafone. Vodafone itself was formed in 1982 as a joint venture between Racal Electronics plc's subsidiary Racal Strategic Radio Ltd (who won one of two UK cellular telephone network licences) along with Millicom and the Hambros Technology Trust. In this arrangement Racal owned 80%, Millicom 15% and Hambros 5%. The network was known as Racal Vodafone, with the Vodafone name being derived from the firm's goal of establishing a voice and data services over cellular telecommunication networks. Hence VO represented voice and DA symbolized data yielding the name Vodafone. Vodafone was launched on 1 January 1985 and later that year Racal Strategic Radio was renamed Racal Telecommunications Group Limited in 1985. A year later, on 29 December 1986 Racal Electronics bought out the minority shareholders of Vodafone for GB110 million. In September 1988 the company was again renamed Racal Telecom and on 26 October 1988 Racal Electronics floated 20% of the company a flotation that valued Racal Telecom at GB1.7

billion. On 16 September 1991 Racal Telecom was demerged from Racal Electronics as Vodafone Group and the mobile telephony giant was born. During the mix 1990s Vodafone began to consolidate itself on the British high-street. In July 1996 Vodafone acquired the two thirds of Talkland it did not already own for 30.6 million. On 19 November 1996, in a defensive move, Vodafone purchased Peoples Phone for 77 million, a 181 store chain whose customers were overwhelmingly using Vodafone's network. In a similar move the company acquired the 80% of Astec Communications that it did not own, a service provider with 21 stores. This made Vodafone a very visible presence on the British high street and significantly increased the company's share of UK mobile customers.

New Corporate Logo of Vodafone as of 1997. In 1997 Vodafone introduced its new corporate Speechmark logo. This represents a quotation mark within a circle. With the 'O's in the Vodafone logotype being opening and closing quotation marks, suggesting conversation.

Vodafone in Europe
The late 1990s and early 200s saw Vodafone grow dramatically via a number of strategic acquisitions. The first of these ocurred on 29th June 1999 when Vodafone completed its purchase of AirTouch Communications, Inc. and changed its name to Vodafone Airtouch plc. This acquisition also gave Vodafone a 35% share of Mannesmann, owner of the largest German mobile network. On 21st September 1999 Vodafone agreeded to merge its U.S. wireless assets with those of Bell Atlantic Corp to form Verizon Wireless. In November 1999 Vodafone made an unsolicited (hostile) bid for Mannesmann, which was rejected. During 1999 Mannesman had purchesed the UK mobile operator Orange and both Vodafone and Mannesman were now operating in the same markets. The hostile takeover provoked strong protest in Germany and there insued a board struggle which saw Mannesmann resist Vodafone's efforts. However on 3 February 2000 the Mannesmann board agreed to an increased offer of 112bn, then the largest corporate merger ever. The EU approved the merger in April 2000. On 28th July 2000 the company reverted to its former name, Vodafone Group Plc. The conglomerate was subsequently broken up and all manufacturing related operations sold off. Investment also continued in new technologies and on 16th April 2001 Vodafone made the first 3G voice call on Vodafone United Kingdom's 3G network.

Acquisitions also continued and in 2001 Vodafone takes over Eircell (part of eircom) in Ireland, rebranding the company Vodafon Ireland. A year later Vodafone acquired Japan's third-largest mobile operator J-Phone, which was the first operator to introduce camera phones in Japan. A major shift came on 17th December 2001 where Vodafone introduces the concept of 'Partner Networks' by signing TDC Mobil of Denmark. The new concept involves the introduction of Vodafone international services to the local market, without the need of investment by Vodafone. The concept would be used to extend the Vodafone brand and services into markets where it does not have stakes in local operators. Vodafone services would be marketed under the dual-brand scheme, where the Vodafone brand is added at the end of the local brand. (i.e., TDC Mobil-Vodafone etc.) In 2002 Vodafone rebrands Japan's J-sky mobile internet as Vodafone live! which presaged the global rollout of both the brand and the service.

Map of Vodafone activities in Europe where red areas represent countries where Vodafone is active as a corporate entity, orange areas represent Vodafone partners and Blue areas represnet Vodafone's partners. In Europe the acquisition of partner networks continues apace with a number of partner deals and acquisitions. These include:
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2 February 2002: Radiolinja of Finland is signed as a Partner Network. (Radiolinja later becomes Elisa.) 3 December 2002: The brand is introduced into the Estonian market with the signing of a Partner Network Agreement with Radiolinja (Eesti).

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7 January 2003: Vodafone signs a group-wide Partner agreement with mobilkom Austria. This brings Austria, Croatia, and Slovenia into the Vodafone community. 16 April 2003: Og Vodafone is introduced in the Icelandic market. 13 May 2003:Omnitel is rebranded Vodafone Italy. 21 July 2003: Lithuania is added to the community, with the signing of a Partner Network agreement with Bit. 16 February 2004: Vodafone signs a Partner Network Agreement with Luxembourg's LuxGSM. 20 February 2004: Vodafone signs a Partner Network Agreement with Cyta of Cyprus. Cyta agreed to rename its mobile phone operations to Cytamobile-Vodafone. April 2004: Vodafone purchases Singlepoint airtime provider from John Caudwell (Caudwell Group) and adds 1.5million customers onto its consumer base. June 2005: Increases its participation in Romania's Connex to 99%; also buys Czech mobile operator Oskar. (on the 1st of July Oskar is rebranded as Oskar-Vodafone. 28 October 2005: Connex in Romania is rebranded as Connex-Vodafone. 31 October 2005: Vodafone reaches an agreement to sell Vodafone Sweden to Telenor for approximately 1 billion. After the sale, Vodafone Sweden becomes a Partner Network. 13 December 2005: Vodafone wins an auction to buy Turkey's second-largest mobile phone company, Telsim, for $4.5 billion. 22 February 2006: Vodafone announces that it is extending its footprint to Bulgaria with the signing of Partner Network Agreement with Mobiltel, which is part of mobilkom Austria group. 11 April 2006: Vodafone announces that it has signed an extension to its Partner Network Agreement with BITE Group, enabling its Latvian subsidiary "BITE Latvija" to become the latest member of Vodafone's global partner community. 1 May 2007: Vodafone adds Jersey and Guernsey to the community, as Airtel is signed as Partner Network in both crown dependencies

Vodafone in Asia-Pecific
Vodafone was comitted to becoming a global mobile communications provider and in the early 1990s the company began its move into the Asia-Pacific markets. In July 1993 the first mobile service, that of BellSouth in New Zealand went live. Vodafone wasn't far behind, with its own network: Vodafone Australi going live in October the same year. July 1994 saw Vodafone's Fiji network going live. In November 1998 Vodafone purchased BellSouth New Zealand which later became re-branded as Vodafone New Zealand. On October 1, 2003 J-Phone (which Vodafone had purchased in 2002) becomes 'Vodafone'; J-Phone's mobile internet service J-Sky becomes Vodafone Live! December 2004 saw a partner deal with SmarTone of Hong Kong which becomes 'SmarToneVodafone' in April 2005. On 28th October 2005 Vodafone announces the acquisition of a 10 per cent stake in India's Bharti Televentures, which operates the largest mobile phone network in India under the brand name AirTel. On 25th January 2006 Vodafone announces that Indonesia, Malaysia and Sri Lanka are

added to the Vodafone footprint as Vodafone Group signs a partner network agreement with Telekom Malaysia. On 6th February 2007 Samoa is added as a Partner Market.

Vodafone in the Middle East and Africa

The drive into the Middle East was led by Vodafone Egypt which went live under the name ClickGSM in October 1998. Then, on 18th September 2002 Vodafone signs a partner agreement with the MTC group of Kuwait which is re-branded to MTC-Vodafone. On November 3rd 2004 Vodoafone announces that its South African affiliate, Vodacom, has agree to introduce Vodafone's international services and partner agreements to its local mraket. On the 3rd November 2005 Vodafone increases its stake in Vodacom Group by buying-out the 15% stake held by VenFin. This gives Vodafone a 50% stake in Vodacom. On the 8th November 2006 Vodafone announces a deal with Telecom Egypt resulting in further co-operation in the Egyptian market; and increasing of stake in Vodafone Egypt. After the deal, Vodafone Egypt will be 55% owned by the group, while the remaining 45% will be owned by Telecom Egypt.

Vodafone in the USA

Vodafone entered the US market in 1999 when it merged its operations with that of AirTouch Communications in June of that year; thereby changing its name to Vodafone Airtouch Plc. In September 1999 Vodafone Airtouch announced a $70-billion joint venture with Bell Atlantic Corp. The first wireless business with a national footprint in the U.S., Verizon Wireless was composed of Bell Atlantic's and Vodafone AirTouch's U.S. wireless assets and began operations on April 4, 2000. However, Verizon Communicationsthe company formed when Bell Atlantic and GTE merged on June 30, 2000owns a majority of Verizon Wireless and Vodafone's branding is not used, nor is the CDMA network compatible with GSM phones. The story between Vodafone and Verizon has not always been a happy one, due primarly to the bidding war that Vodafone won for Airtouch. Ironically, misgivings were but behind one another when Vodafone approached Verizon to form a joint partnership and hold a minority stake in Verizon Communications. Together, Vodafone and Verizon built a profitable $20 billion business, whose network serves more U.S. wireless customers than any other carrier within the U.S. "But Vodafone's global ambitions and other strains in the relationship - including a bail-out clause some call 'the nuclear option' - put the venture at risk of breaking up". This "nuclear bomb option" is a essentially a part of the contract that takes effect for 60 days at which at this time Vodafone can demand that Verizon pay it $10 billion in return for a large chunk of Vodafone's stake within a 60 day period. In July 2003 was the first time this window of dissolution option took effect. The amount Verizon would have to pay to Vodafone for this pull out option would depend on an appraisal of the venture. In future years, this window again opens for 60 days. Consequently the clause sets an interval period for Vodafone to pull out of this joint venture. Vodafone is primarily frustrated by the company's lack of control in the U.S. It is clear Vodafone aspires to be a household name when it comes to wireless, and it's inability to make it's presence know in one of the most reputable and sought after market , the United States, is a major setback

for the corporation's global GSM network goals. Moreover, because it owns just 45% of the partnership, Vodafone hasn't yet been able to get its name attached to a single product of the joint venture. In addition, a critical issue is Vodafone also can't persuade the venture to use a technology compatible with the one Vodafone uses for most of the 28 other countries, and more than 100 million customers, that it serves. What may be one of the greater obstacles in developing a truly integrated knowledge sharing partnership is the difference in network standards both companies use. It is increasingly frustrating for Vodafone executives to be unable to utilize their own cell phones when doing business in the United States. This is because the GSM (global system for mobile) network the Vodafone utilizes, which is the European standard) is not compatible with the system the United States utilizes, which is a patchwork of various standards., The system Verizon utilizes is CDMA, Code Division Multiple Access, and consequently Vodafone executives and customers can not use their own cell phones on their joint venture partner's network. Moreover, Verizon says it preparing to roll out technology that it says will permit wireless Web browsing at speeds far faster than Vodafone's "next generation" service. As the case for Vodafone stands, they roam to a GSM carrier in the United States when they attempt to use their cell phones. Unfortunately for Vodafone, the position is held by T- Mobile, a service of Deutsche Telekom AG. T -mobil is a U.S. affiliate service that runs on the same standard as its parent Deutsche Telekom, and Vodafone's main rival in Europe, Deutsche Telekom is successfully taking a huge portion of the U.S. market, and penetrating the American market (the second largest market after China), successfully. Perhaps as a consequence of these reasons, Vodafone made a bid for the entirety of AT&T Wireless when that company was for sale in 2004. Had this bid been successful, Vodafone would presumably have sold its stake in Verizon Wireless, and then rebranded the resultant business as Vodafone. However, Cingular Wireless (a joint venture of SBC Communications and BellSouth (both now AT&T)) ultimately outbid Vodafone and took control of AT&T Wireless. Vodafone also made a bid for Nextel (whom Sprit bought out) in attempts to materialize and broaden the dreams of entering the US market. Early in 2006 Verizon re-iterated their desire to buy-out the remaining 45% of Stock of Verizon Wireless from Vodafone Group. Vodafone has also repeatedly indicated that it would be willing to buy out Verizon's stake.

Vodafone in the Americas

On 15 November 2005, Vodafone Group announced a group-wide co-operation agreement with Amrica Mvil of Mexico. The agreement involves co-operation on international services and roaming. The services include Voice and GPRS Roaming services, Preferred Roaming and Virtual Home Environment. Included in the agreement are the 13 networks owned and controlled by Amrica Mvil (except Tracfone in the United States), and the various operating companies of Vodafone and its Partner Networks. On 6 February 2007, Vodafone Group signed a three-year partnership agreement with Digicel Group in the Carribean. The two groups will also become preferred roaming partners of each

other. Along with Digicel's markets, the Vodafone brand is now present in 81 countries, regions, and territories