Digicel claims more than four million customers

Denis O'Brien's telecoms company Digicel has said it has more than four million customers and achieved subscriber growth of 100 per cent in 2006.

The company said it had added one million customers in its first eight months in operation in Haiti. It said it defined a subscriber as being active if the subscriber had "a chargeable event" in the previous 30 days.

Digicel group chief executive Colm Delves said the total investment in the Caribbean by the end of 2006 was $1.5 billion (€1.15 billion). It closed a $150 million bond offering in August 2006.

In November Time magazine reported that Digicel had three million subscribers.

Mr O'Brien has stated his ambition to move into the US market and sources close to him have said he is preparing for the flotation of Digicel on the New York Stock Exchange. However, a spokeswoman had no comment to make on this last night.

Mr Delves, in his review of 2006, said the group had moved into Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and El Salvador. In Haiti, he said, "Digicel brought an unprecedented investment of $260 million to the developing nation, the largest investment ever made in the country by an international company".

In October 2006 the group moved into the central American market. It also bought an operator in Guyana.

Because of the group's growth, it has increased the number of its employees to 3,000, Mr Delves said. "We look forward to 2007 and continuing our ambitious growth in key target markets."