Yota

Yota (Йота) is a Russian mobile phone brand and mobile broadband manufacturer. Yota is a trademark of Skartel LLC. On May 9, 2012, Yota's WiMAX was replaced by its LTE network. In September 2012, 4G networks were launched in the Russian cities of Novosibirsk, Krasnodar, Moscow, Sochi, Samara, Vladivostok, Ufa, Kazan and St. Petersburg. Garsdale Services Investment Ltd. owns 100% of Yota's shares and 50% of MegaFon's shares. In turn, Garsdale is controlled by AF Telecom (82%), Telconet Capital (13.5%), and the Russian Technologies State Corporation (4.5%). In 2006, the co-owner of the St. Petersburg company Korus, Denis Sverdlov and Bulgarian businessman Sergey Adonev, established the first provider of WiMAX, a new data transfer technology. In 2006, WiMAX was used in China, India, Indonesia, Taiwan and the United States. In 2008, Skartel was the first company in Russia to deploy WiMAX standard network in Moscow and St Petersburg in a range of 2.5-2.7 GHz. In 2010 Yota announced its plans to launch LTE on its network. The first test of the new standard network took place in Kazan, on 30 August 2010. The subscribers gained access to the Internet at a rate of 20-30 Mbit/s. About 150 base stations have been installed in Kazan. The investments into the LTE network deployment constituted $20 million. The fourth generation LTE network, which was tested by the Yota provider in Kazan, was switched off the next day. At that point, Yota had no interest to use a 4G standard network in a commercial or test mode. In April 2019, Yota filed for bankruptcy. The bankruptcy stemmed from a lawsuit filed against the company by its contracted manufacturer, Hi-P Singapore. Officially, Novosibirsk was the first Russian city where the LTE network was deployed, commercially launched on December 22, 2011. Then this new format of communications was adopted in Krasnodar (29 April 2012), Moscow (10 May 2012), and Sochi (11 May 2012). Samara was connected to LTE on 23 May 2013. And later on Ufa and Saint Petersburg have also joined this service.