Sistema Shyam Teleservices (SSTL) as part of its ongoing pan-India expansion plan, announced the launch of its mobile services under the MTS brand. Henceforth the Hello Rainbow brand will cease to exist. The move also marks the Indian JV coming under the 100 million subscriber base strong MTS brand.

Since its launch in October 2008 under the new JV, SSTL claims to have crossed the half million subscriber base in the state. The company aims to increase its presence in the retail space from the current 15,000 to 20,000 June 2009.

Further company plans to increase its coverage of the state’s population from the present figures of 53 % to 72% within three months. This will see the addition of 600 more base stations to its tally of 833 base stations.

MTS also introduced new schemes for the consumers in the state to mark its grand launch. The launch offer enables subscribers to have free calling as well as SMS within MTS networks in the state for six months. This includes calls to MTS mobile as well as fixedline connections. Calls to other networks within the state will be charged 50 paise while STD calls will be charged Re.1 per minute. The launch offer will be available from 23rd April – 30th June, 2009.

For existing prepaid mobile subscribers the company has extended the free intra network calling facility to include MTX fixedline services as well. This offer is added in the Rs. 100 STV [Special Tariff Vouchers with Full Talk Time] which the customer pays to enjoy his current benefits for 30 days.

For its prepaid fixed wireless subscribers the company launched a new offer at Rs 999 offering lifetime validity as well as 999 minutes of intra network calls for 90 days.

For the PCO owners, MTS will offer CCB plan with instrument is priced at Rs. 1250 with Rs. 2000 Talktime (Rs. 1250 MTS to MTS network & Rs. 750 to other networks) and 365 days validity.

Postpaid subscribers will get 100 Free pulses as loyalty bonus.

Speaking at the launch, Mr. Vsevolod Rozanov, President and CEO of Sistema Shyam TeleServices said, “We are delighted to rebrand ‘Rainbow’ in Rajasthan to the internationally acclaimed ‘MTS brand’. Rainbow did exceedingly well for us and this is but a natural progression to rationalize the mobile telephony offerings from SSTL under a single brand name in India. I am confident that the MTS brand will leverage on the strengths of the Rainbow brand as far as customer centricity, diversity and choice of offerings as well as quality of network coverage are concerned. MTS is a hugely successful and globally well-exposed international brand and will surely cut a niche in the increasingly volatile and dynamic Indian telecom market.”

Mr. Alok Tandon, Managing Director, of SSTL added, “Our focus remains to connect the 800 million Indians, who are yet to be connected. We are committed to the development of India’s Telecom infrastructure and services and will continue to offer unique offers to our customers as part of our growth strategy.”

 “We’ve had a great stint in Rajasthan so far, with a more than 500,000 Mobile subscriber base. The entry of MTS will significantly accelerate the pace of our growth and augment our efforts in continuing to maintain high performance standards and service delivery. By August, we intend to increase our coverage to over 900 towns & over 13,000 villages of the state”, said Mr. Harsh Chandra, Chief Operating Officer, Rajasthan.