Saudi Telecom Chief Executive Resigns - Sources

Saudi Telecom Chief Executive Resigns – Sources

The chief executive of Saudi Telecom Co (STC), Saud al-Daweesh, has resigned, two company sources said on Monday, without giving a reason for his departure.

April 2, 2012 5:11 by kippreport

In January the former monopoly reported a 19 percent drop in net profits to 7.67 billion riyals ($2.1 billion).

Daweesh was appointed chief executive in 2009, seven years after the company floated 30 percent of its shares on the local stock market.

STC, which remains majority government-owned nearly a decade after its partial privatisation, has operations across the Muslim world from Turkey to Indonesia.

In recent months the company has been credited with arresting a decline in its financial performance based on rising domestic revenue which was buoyed by aggressively priced broadband bundles.

However, it has struggled to grow its foreign operations as rapidly as it had planned, with revenue outside the kingdom accounting for 32 percent of the group total – well short of its 50 percent target.

STC’s shares were trading down 0.2 percent on Monday at 41.20 riyals a share. (Reporting By Ibrahim al-Mutawa and Angus McDowall in Riyadh and Matt Smith in Dubai; Editing by Amran Abocar and Greg Mahlich)