According to Inessa Galaktionova, CEO of MTS, one of the largest telecommunication operators in Russia, the company’s subsidiary Irtea is planning to enter the Kazakhstani market.
Irtea is a telecom vendor that also develops software and manufactures carrier-class LTE and 5G base stations in Russia. The company was established in 2021. Initially known as MTS Electronics, it was 100% owned by MTS. Currently, the mobile operator holds a 50% stake in the company, while the other half is owned by the investment fund Advanced Technologies.
As Galaktionova noted, MTS is actively encouraging the international expansion of its business units. For instance, in the summer of 2025, the company plans to test its 5G equipment in Belarus.
«This isn’t limited to the CIS — we’re also looking at markets like Indonesia, Africa and the United Arab Emirates. And it’s not just about equipment, but also a range of IT products that are in high demand,» she said.
The CEO believes that MTS’s solutions, such as the Exolve cloud platform for automating business communications with clients and the Link platform for collaboration and internal communications, will be in high demand abroad. She emphasized that these products are technologically superior to Zoom and Skype. (Notably, Skype ceased operations in May 2025.)
«We decided to test some of our products in Belarus and Kazakhstan. If we see that this goes beyond a pilot project and offers real prospects for scale, we will develop a full-fledged strategy for working in these foreign markets. For us, ‘scale’ means a business with investments of no less than 1 billion rubles (approximately $12.7 million). Otherwise, the costs of setting up operations wouldn’t be justified,» Galaktionova said.
The telecommunications market in Kazakhstan is becoming increasingly diverse, as ambitious players seek to promote their new solutions. For instance, Freedom Telecom has been working on establishing a East-West fiber-optic hyperhighway, as well as a Tier III or higher data processing center to transit and store international traffic. The company is part of the international group Freedom Holding Corp.
