Another retailer joins MVNO ranks

Biedronka, the supermarket chain owned by Portuguese group Jeronimo Martins, has launched as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO), according to Polish website www.di.com.pl. The resold mobile service is being offered under the brand ‘Tu Biedronka’, over the network of Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa (PTC). French-owned retail chain Carrefour already offers MVNO services in Poland under the Mova brand, and says it has signed up over 30,000 active customers since launching last April, a figure it plans to increase to 100,000 this year. According to figures quoted by di.com, at the end of the third quarter of 2008 ten MVNO operators in Poland shared 165,000 active users, or 0, 4% of mobile end-users in the country.