Melita Mobile gets €8.5 million investment

Melita Group shareholders yesterday announced that following successful discussions with their senior lenders, they will be injecting €8.5 million into Melita Mobile while a further €14.5 million loan facility will be made available by Melita plc to Melita Mobile for draw-down until 2015, repayable in 2018.

This shareholder investment will be used to further finance projects aimed at improving mobile indoor coverage through the implementation of the newly acquired 900MHz mobile frequencies as well as other initiatives aimed at enhancing customer experience. The financing, Melita said, will support the rapid growth of the mobile business.

The company said customers should experience improved indoor and outdoor coverage over the next few weeks in specific localities including Mgarr, Mellieha (Qortin Area), Qormi and Rabat as new equipment comes online shortly. These capital injections are in addition to the €10 million injected by the company’s ultimate shareholders into Melita Mobile during the period December 2010 – June 201.

Melita Group CEO Andre Torriani said: “Once again the company’s ultimate shareholders have demonstrated a commitment to invest in the continued growth of the Melita Mobile business. This funding, along with the agreement reached with our senior lenders, strongly positions the Melita Capital Group to pursue the investments required to achieve further growth of its core businesses.” Melita said in a statement that according to recently published statistics Melita Mobile has been re-confirmed as the fastest growing mobile operator in Malta and the preferred choice of existing mobile users.

“Statistics published by the Malta Communications Authority have shown that by the end of 2010 Melita Mobile accounted for almost 16 per cent of all mobile outgoing minutes made by mobile phone users,” it said.