Vodafone announces new organisational structure

UK-based operator Vodafone has announced a reorganisation of its structure from October 1, giving another clue to the future sales of its minority assets.

The Group’s operating companies will be divided into two operating regions, Europe which will now include the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Turkey, and Africa, Middle East and Asia Pacific: comprising all emerging economies in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, plus Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.

Vodafone’s investments in Verizon Wireless, SFR, Polkomtel and Bharti Holding will no longer be held within the regional structures, and will instead be held within the Group CEO, CFO and Strategy & Business Development Director. This move is in anticipation of an evetual sale of each of these units.

“Vodafone has been slowly drip-feeding clues to the market of its future plans in advance of an eagerly-awaited update on its future strategy later in 2010,” says Thomas Wehmeier, principal analyst at Informa Telecoms & Media.

“The announcement, which follows news earlier in the week of the sale of its stake in China Mobile, is simply the latest piece of a jigsaw that is beginning to offer a glimpse of the future shape of Vodafone.”

The new organisation is designed to focus on Vodafone’s key commercial and financial priorities: customer and commercial strength, leadership in data, brand advocacy, cost efficiency and shareholder returns, and to simplify the Group’s organisation, by reducing layers and simplifying managerial governance.

“The structural changes in themselves reveal little in the way of concrete evidence of further strategic plans, but it’s fair to say that as the Internet erodes the relevance of geographical boundaries and as business continues to be conducted above and beyond simple national borders, so the importance of operating coherently on a cross-regional basis grows,” said Wehmeier.