touch: the leading mobile operator in Lebanon

By libc Last updated Jan 21, 2021

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Established in 2004, touch (formerly known as mtc touch) is the leading mobile telecommunications and data operator in Lebanon with a market share standing at 53%. Touch is managed by Zain Group, the region’s first mobile and data services operator with a commercial footprint today in 8 Middle Eastern and African countries.

While ensuring high levels of professionalism, performance and consumer satisfaction, touch is committed to deliver innovative and cost effective services answering the particular needs of various market segments. In 2014, touch continued to grow its business by enhancing customer experience, ramping up mobile digital services as well as exploring new market opportunities.

In parallel, touch implements an ongoing optimization for the 3.9G network and expansion plan for the 4G-LTE (Long Term Evolution) network widest coverage in the Lebanese capital. In 2013, touch was the first mobile operator to conduct for the first time in the world, a successful 4G LTE Advanced pilot test over the 800 and 1800 bandwidths, in collaboration with Huawei.

Emre Gurkan – Chief Executive Officer

Emre Gurkan, CEO of touch, is a seasoned telecommunications executive with over 25 years of experience in international ICT, telecom and management consulting sectors working with global telecom operators and media companies across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East and Africa. His strengths extend to corporate strategy, digital and business transformation, mergers and acquisitions, outsourcing and optimization as well as marketing, sales and driving customer-centric operating cultures.

Along with his role in touch, Emre is the Group Chief Strategy and Business Development Officer of Zain Group, having been appointed to this position in the beginning of 2014. He is the originator of Zain’s Digital and Innovation Frontier (ZDIF) which is tasked with cementing the position of the Group within the digital space, focusing on the areas of innovation, digital services, corporate venturing and smart cities. ZDIF has successfully elevated Zain to becoming a leader in digital transformation across the region.Emre is also a Board member in Zain’s various ZDFI companies and start-ups.

Highlights of his tenure in Zain include the closing of highly-regarded deals with Uber and Booking.com; strategic investments by Zain in numerous regional and global venture capital funds, and in the UAE-based smart city consultancy firm neXgen, Lebanon’s mobile solutions provider FOO, connected car rental company YoYo in Bahrain and big data monetization platform in Kuwait. Emre was also one of the architects of Zain’s recently announced partnership with leading TV and video online service provider ‘iflix’, which will see the entertainment service rolled out across the region imminently.

Prior to joining Zain, he was the Group Chief Strategy and Synergy Officer at Oger Telecom operating across three continents. He has also held senior roles globally in management consulting firms, McKinsey & Co. and A.T. Kearney working in Atlanta, Dallas, Istanbul and Dubai offices setting strategies and advising leading telecom operators, high-tech companies, financial institutions and government organizations across various regions. In addition, he also worked at Turkcell and Baan Company and was a co-founder of an IT consulting and applications development company, IDEA.

Emre holds an MBA from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management, an MS in Management Information Systems from London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and a BS in Computer Engineering from Istanbul Technical University. He has also undertaken research on Corporate Finance at MIT, and published three white papers and a book on Relationship Management. He is a board member of World Economic Forum’s “Internet For All” initiative and a member of Chief Strategy Officers’ Group (CSOG) at the GSMA.

Zain

Zain is a leading mobile and data services operator in the Middle East and North Africa. We began life in 1983 in Kuwait, as Mobile Telecommunications Company (MTC), the region’s first mobile operator, and commencing with the initiation of our expansion strategy in 2003, we grew rapidly in both the Middle East and Africa through the acquisition of several mobile operators across the region. In September 2007, MTC rebranded to Zain in order to better reflect our growing status as a leading regional mobile service provider. Zain was thus adopted as the Group’s corporate master brand. We continued on our journey of growth and development, and in March 2009, entered into a 50/50 partnership with Al Ajial Investment Fund Holding to acquire a 31% stake in Inwi, the third mobile telecom operator in Morocco. Today, we have a commercial footprint in 8 countries in the region and over 6,200 employees provide a comprehensive range of market-leading mobile voice and data services to a base of over 46.9 million active customers as of 31 March 2018. We operate as Zain in Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, South Sudan; and in Lebanon as touch (under a management contract).

For more information on touch please visit: www.touch.com.lb
For more information on Zain and our operations please visit: www.zain.com