Orange Africa

Orange Africa is a mobile telecommunications company in Africa and the Middle East, founded in 2021 by OWL Ventures and Vuori, both predecessors to Illustrious. It is currently owned by Crown Cellular (in turn owned by Vuori's founder Kasperi Salovaara) and the consortium Orange Africa Holdings Limited.

History
Styhon Battersea Telecommunications Asia-Pacific, Middle East & Africa Limited was formed out of a merger between ​Axiata Group​, ​Millicom​, ​Bharti Airtel​, ​Zain Group​, ​Vodacom​, ​Global Telecom Holding​/​VEON​, ​Africell​ and ​MTN Group​, integrated with NEQSOL Holding's telecommunications operations, and Vodafone's operations in Oceania, Africa, Asia and Middle East, all under Styhon Battersea's ownership.

Hoot Middle East & Africa was formed out of the consolidation of African assets owned by Orange SA, Altice and Viettel Global, which OWL acquired shortly before founding Orange Africa. Nexttel in Cameroon was merged into Orange Cameroon during the consolidation.

During November and December 2020, Styhon Battersea announced to merge into Vuori, which caused Vuori to consider merging it's African operations with Hoot's African operations. Airtel Africa, Vodacom, Hoot Middle East & Africa, Africell, Moov, Mascom, Maroc Telecom, Touch (Lebanon), Zain, Batelco, Vodafone Africa and MTN Group soon were consolidated into Orange in 2021, under a joint venture between OWL and Vuori.

In February 2021, Orange Africa Holdings Limited absorbed its subsidiary Styhon Battersea Telecommunications Network Development Company and bought an additional 2% stake in the company from Hoot and Crown. They also acquired Mauritius Telecom, Eritel, Evatis, Comores Telecom, MTN Irancell, Almadar Aljadid (Al-Madar), MTC, and Getesa & Gecomsa, which soon were absorbed into Orange Africa, with Mauritius, Eritrea, Djibouti, Comores, Iran, Libya, Namibia and the Equatorial Guinea state respectively joining the consortium - later on, Crown's parent company Lotus managed to buy their stake out in exchange of some Class B shares in itself. During Hoot Telecom's sale of assets, they sold their 34% stake in Orange Africa to OAHL and Crown, with Crown taking the majority. Orange Africa will still operate under the Orange brand through a licensing deal that will expire on December 31, 2024.

In March 2021, MTN Mobile Money, tigo Pesa, Mobi Cash, JazzCash and Flous were merged into Orange Bank, which Orange Africa operates in serving countries under license from Orange. Orange Africa Holdings Limited announced a partnership between Orange Africa and Better Than Cash Alliance to start heavily promoting digital and mobile payments in the Middle East and Africa, to small and regular businesses, later that year.

In August 2021, Vodafone Egypt was sold to VodafoneThree plc.

Ownership structure
During the formation of Orange Africa, Hoot and Crown settled on the former getting a majority stake, since they owned all rights to the Orange brand. Orange Africa works as a licensee.


 * Crown (55% equity stake; 49% voting power)
 * Governments of Saudi Arabia (through GOSI, TeleInvest and PIF) and Vietnam (through ) in association with Crown's parent company Lotus (owning 75% of this venture) and the governments of United Arab Emirates, Morocco, Nigeria, Iran and Qatar, along with investors from the countries (45% equity stake held collectively under Orange Africa Holdings Limited; 51% voting power)

Presence
They have joint ventures with Ericsson and Siemens to improve Orange's networks in Middle East and Africa.

Subsidiaries and stakes

 * ​Roshan​ (12.25%) - Afghanistan; inherited from Telia Company acquisition
 * ​Expresso Telecom​ (75%) - Ghana and Senegal
 * ​Tunisie Telecom​ - 15% stake; Tunisia, acquired in 2020
 * ​Safaricom​ - 40% stake; Kenya
 * 9mobile - majority stake; Nigeria
 * ​Mobily​ - 27% stake; Saudi Arabia
 * ​ Emtel (50%) - Mauritius
 * Kenya Postel Directories (60%) - Kenya
 * ​Sabafon​ (~27%) - Yemen
 * ​ Vodacom - South Africa
 * ​Korek Telecom​ (20%) - Iraqi Kurdistan
 * ​Ufone​ - 26% stake; Pakistan
 * ​ELTA (55%) - Angolan phone directory company
 * ​Jazz​ - Pakistan
 * ​Somali Telecom Group​
 * Somafone​
 * ​Netco​
 * Orange Ethiopia - a joint venture with ​Ethio Telecom​, through which they will improve mobile services and also offer them through the Orange brand
 * Orange Bank Africa