'There's an opportunity to provide customers with a sophisticated network and new technology like WiMAX [wireless broadband services],' Comium chairman Nizar Dalloul told MEED in early July. 'Most existing operators do not offer the latest services. People are being short-changed.' The company has 250,000 subscribers in Liberia and Sierra Leone and expects to launch operations in the Ivory Coast in early 2007.

Comium is looking to expand its WiMax wireless broadband operation into Europe and the Middle East.

'We are aggressively pursuing WiMax in the Middle East,' Dalloul said. 'We intend to be a leader. You don't see a lot of WiMax operators in the region.' Currently, the operator provides internet services in Iraq, where it has 250,000 dial-up subscribers.

Comium was launched in 2003 and claims to be the only privately owned GSM operator in the region.