MTS RECEIVES NATIONAL TELECOM AWARD

Conferred the “Most Successful New Telecom Operator” award by Sh. Gurudas Kamat, Hon’ble Minister of State for Communications & Information Technology

Registered exponentially growing subscriber base of 1.35mn subscribers in over 2200 towns across India!

New Delhi, July 24, 2009: MTS, the mobile telephony brand of Sistema-Shyam Teleservices (SSTL), has announced that it has been conferred National Telecom Award for being the most successful new telecom operator in India. Mr. T. Narasimhan and Mr. Raymond Armes, Deputy CEOs, Shyam Sistema TeleServices Ltd. received the award on behalf of the company from Sh. Gurudas Kamat, Hon’ble Minister of State for Communications & Information Technology, Government of India.

The award is recognition of MTS establishing itself as a strong challenger brand in the market. SSTL launched its operations on September 30, 2008 and introduced the MTS brand of services in India from Chennai in March 2009. The company has already invested about $1.2 billion in the country and is going strong on its plans for a pan India roll out. It is currently present in six telecom circles and already enjoys a growing subscriber base of more than 1.35 million, in less than 5 months of its launch.

“Having launched its operations in India late last year, SSTL has been expanding its MTS brand across telecom circles in a phased and aggressive manner. Its early subscription numbers crossing a million mark, are a testimony that the company is set to replicate its global brand success in India. It also is the only new operator to have licenses to operate in all 22 telecom circles, covering the entire country, and plans to be present in all these circles by mid-2010”, said Mr. N.K.Goyal, President, CMAI.

Sharing their plans for the immediate future, Mr.Narasimhan, Deputy CEO, SSTL, said, “We are very excited to receive the National Telecom Award for most successful new telecom operator. It is a major boost to the morale of our MTS team which has been working passionately to win over hearts of customers in India! We are gaining critical mass in subscriber numbers across India, and continue to garner increased subscriber confidence in our superior quality services. We are now geared to rapidly expand our presence across the country. Presently, we are working on the last-mile strategies for introducing our path-breaking MTS services to subscribers in Delhi NCR. This would be followed close on the heels with launches in Mumbai and Karnataka.

The company, as a global leader, places significant importance to its environmental footprint. SSTL has partnered with IBM to develop green data centres in Chennai and Delhi NCR (NOIDA) with an investment of $5 million. These green data centres are expected to provide MTS an energy saving of upto 20%.

MTS Brand has been ranked among the BRANDZ Top 100 Most Powerful Brands, for the second year in a row. MTS enjoys a brand-equity of $9.2 billion, and 100 million subscribers across geographies.

About Sistema Shyam Teleservices:

Sistema Shyam TeleServices (SSTL) is a joint venture company between Sistema {LSE: SSA} of Russia and Shyam Group of India. Sistema is the majority share holder in this joint venture with a 74% equity stake, along with the Shyam Group, holding a 23.5% stake and the rest 2.5% being public partake. SSTL has spectrum to provide mobile telephony services in all the 22 circles across the country. In a recent development, SSTL tied up with Mobile TeleSystems OJSC of Russia to bring the globally acclaimed telecom brand-MTS-to India. MTS is the 8th largest telecom brand in the world and has recently been voted as the 71st ranked brand out of 100 top global brands in the world by Millward Brown. For further details please visit: www.mtsindia.com

Media Contact:

Ms. Shalini Vig Wadhwa

Corporate Communications

Mobile: 9711209768

pr {at} mtsindia(.)in