ISLAMABAD: Mobilink officially confirmed on Monday that it has given up its brand name and will now be called as Jazz after its merger with Warid in late 2015.

Jazz — which will now represent the merged operations of both Mobilink and Warid — has also significantly reduced the number of outlets.

It was informed during a media briefing attended by Augie K. Fabela, co-founder and chairman emeritus of Jazz’s parent company VimpelCom, Jazz CEO Aamir Ibrahim, Chief of Corporate Affairs Ali Naseer and Director Communications and Sustainability Anjum Nida Rahman.

“Mobilink was a huge company and it had 335 outlets across the country, but Warid had 330 outlets despite the fact that it was almost one-third of Mobilink,” Mr Ibrahim said. “So we have closed 260 outlets, of which 80 per cent are of Warid.”

It was informed that Warid was doing good business, but it needed more funds to compete with other companies.

However, after the merger all the issues regarding capacity-building were automatically addressed.

Replying to a question that competitors of cell phone companies have now increased, and apps like WhatsApp are also providing call, SMS and other services, he said that Jazz was looking into it and will devise a strategy about it.

“Moreover, we don’t want to limit consumers to just entertainment or simple use of internet. We want to provide them knowledge and education,” he said.

The company says it has more than 49 million subscribers and covers 80pc area of the country.

Published in Dawn February 7th, 2017