Kathmandu, June 18 :

Directors of Visor Group, an international investment fund, visited Kathmandu last week with an objective to assess the current situation and its investment in Nepal.

Visor, based in Kazakhstan, is the major shareholder in Spice Nepal Pvt Ltd (SNPL), the provider of the Mero Mobile service. According to the company, the focus of the visit was to assess Visor’s current investments in Nepal as well as study prospects for new investments in hydropower and infrastructure projects.

The shareholders have positively assessed company’s progress and reiterated its commitment for continuous investment and its plans. During meetings with Spice Nepal management members, Dr Upendra Mahato, president of NRN Association, also pointed out a need to extend network and mobile services, states a company press release.

Aidan Karibzhanov, director of Visor and newly elected chairman of SNPL, had several meetings with government officials, including the prime minister and discussed the current situation and the potential of further investment in Nepal.

Karibzhanov said he was satisfied with the latest developments and expressed his intensions for additional investments in Nepal. However, he pointed out that new government should do more for creating a better investment climate and provide equal treatment to all players in the market if it intends to attract more foreign investments into the country.

SNPL has launched Mero Mobile phone service nine months ago, states the release. “Despite difficulties during the period, the company has continued its network expansion and extended its presence from Kathmandu Valley to Banepa, Dhulikhel, Pokhara and Hetauda. In addition to network expansion, a wide range of new services has been also introduced, most of which available to Mero Mobile subscribers only.”

The Mero Mobile subscribers have been enjoying mobile Internet based on GSM technologies such as GPRS and EDGE for the last six months. Subscribers can access the Internet from their phone sets or use them as modems for their computers and laptops with two payment options available - per actual use of data or monthly unlimited.

Other services include SMS to email, missed call notification, call waiting, and cardless account top-up. A bunch of informational and entertainment services have been made available in collaboration with different content providers such as local and international news, sports updates, voting, contests, horoscope, SMS dating with The Himalayan Times.