ZAIN HOMEPAGE

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

BOARD OF DIRECTORS
MESSAGE

2018 AT A GLANCE

KEY MILESTONES

VICE CHAIRMAN & GROUP
CEO STATEMENT

GROUP KEY PERFORMANCE
INDICATORS

OPERATIONS OVERVIEW

A YEAR IN REVIEW

THE WORLD OF ZAIN

OPERATIONS SNAPSHOT

REGULATORY LANDSCAPE

OUR STRATEGY

TOGETHER WE ARE ZAIN

TECHNOLOGY

ZAIN DRONE

COMMERCIAL

CORPORATE
SUSTAINABILITY

ANNUAL CORPORATE
GOVERNANCE REPORT

CONSOLIDATED ANNUAL
FINANCIAL STATEMENTS
AND INDEPENDENT
AUDITOR'S REPORT

Table of Contents

العربية

VICE CHAIRMAN & GROUP CEO STATEMENT

VICE CHAIRMAN & GROUP CEO
STATEMENT

Q&A WITH BADER AL KHARAFI

SUMMARY OF KEY POINTS

Zain Group was resilient towards internal and external challenges, and focused on innovation to fulfil strategic digital lifestyle aspirations
Exited the year with healthy profitability and a good reason to be optimistic about 2019 and beyond
Primary mission is to participate actively in the Fourth Industrial Revolution and promote social innovation
Turnaround initiatives in Zain Saudi Arabia pay-off as operator records best-ever performance placing the company in a much stronger fiscal position
Revival of Zain Iraq witnesses continual impressive growth on all key indicators
Zain Kuwait leading the region in innovation and digital transformation
Investing heavily in network and Fiber to benefit from the forthcoming commercialization of 5G and the growing needs of enterprise users
Evolving into an organization for the 21st century, operationally, financially, through our Gender Diversity initiative, Corporate Sustainability programs and Internal Innovation

KEY FINANCIAL RESULTS

As at 31 December, 2018. Zain served 49 million customers across its eight-country footprint.

For the full-year 2018, Zain Group recorded consolidated net income of KD 197 million (USD 649 million), up 23% and reflecting Earnings Per Share of 45 Fils (USD 0.15).

Consolidated revenues reached KD 1.3 billion (USD 4.4 billion), an impressive 28% Y-o-Y growth, while consolidated EBITDA for the period increased by 25% Y-o-Y to reach KD 519 million (USD 1.7 billion), reflecting an EBITDA margin of 39%.

For the full-year, foreign currency translation impact, predominantly due to the 47% currency devaluation in Sudan from an average of 16.9 to 31.9 (SDG / USD), deprived the company USD 216 million in revenue, USD 79 million in EBITDA and USD 27 million in net income.

Throughout 2018, Zain Group invested ~ USD 750 million in network expansion and 4G / 5G upgrades including fiber (FTTH) rollout and spectrum fees in several key markets. This supported the growth of Group data revenues (excluding SMS and VAS) that experienced a 71% growth for the full-year 2018, representing 33% of the Group’s total revenues.

HOW DID ZAIN ADAPT TO THE EVOLVING TELECOM LANDSCAPE IN DRIVING SHAREHOLDER VALUE DURING 2018?

Resilience and focus are the words that immediately come to mind. Zain Group was resilient towards internal and external challenges and exited the year with healthy profitability and a good reason to be optimistic about 2019 and beyond. We are focused on fulfilling our strategic vision of transforming into a fully integrated and innovative digital lifestyle provider and exceeding customers’ expectations in all aspects of the services we provide them.

We pride ourselves in remaining a forward-looking organization, and a central theme of Zain Group’s strategy is to maximize shareholder value through business growth and efficiency while seeking value enhancing opportunities and new revenue streams in the digital arena. We are particularly interested in the profitable growth areas of smart cities, IoT and Enterprise (B2B).

We continue to reinvent, transform and enable the core digitally to support vast investments in network upgrades and expansions across all our markets. Furthermore, we are partnering with leading global entities to enhance the appeal and quality of the products and services we make available to our customers via fast and reliable connectivity while carrying out various initiatives to re-engineer customer experience.

As a sustainable conscious company, one of Zain’s primary missions is to have a positive impact on the communities we serve, while undertaking initiatives to participate actively in the Fourth Industrial Revolution and promote social innovation. For us at Zain, the maturing of social innovation is of great importance as it not only addresses society’s most pressing challenges such as youth unemployment, the plight of refugees, economic stagnation and environmental issues, as it provides a legitimate avenue for youth across our footprint to engage in a meaningful manner and be active participants in the socio-economic development of their communities.

Financially, Zain is committed to consistently creating value for shareholders and other stakeholders, and we remained focused on cost optimization and increasing new revenue streams resulting in an impressive Group financial performance as evident above. These inspiring results on multiple levels for 2018 are a true reflection of the dedicated efforts of Zain’s 6,000 strong and talented workforce who work with passion every day, in all that they do.

WHAT WERE THE MAJOR DEVELOPMENTS AND HIGHLIGHTS OF 2018?

No doubt, 2018 was memorable on multiple fronts, building on our digital transformation efforts in seeking growth and expanding beyond standard telecom services to diversify revenues and create value.

Groupwide API

We started the year announcing a landmark agreement in support of the launch of the Zain Group Application Program Interface (API) Platform, which will see Zain exposing its APIs, thus helping to remove a significant barrier to developing potential digital partnerships globally. This strategic initiative, which was primarily undertaken with Google Cloud’s Apigee team and FOO Solutions, is set to bring about greater agility to Zain as we consider new market opportunities, accelerating innovation and expanding into new business verticals.

Zain initially launched the API platform with a pilot phase in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia that has seen excellent success, and we’re planning its gradual extension to all operations, introducing a Group-wide API program with the aim of connecting our operating companies across the region onto a single enablement platform.

Notably, we partnered with the global alternative payment’s provider DoCoMo Digital, the European unit of Japan’s NTT DoCoMo, as our first content partner using the new API layer. DoCoMo Digital offers an advanced mobile commerce ecosystem-enabling platform that encourages financial inclusion for citizens worldwide, also enabling Zain with the most advanced VAS digital content hosted on our own product frameworks and supported by a best-in-class advertising solution platform and service. Zain Kuwait and Zain Saudi Arabia were the first operations to offer DoCoMo Digital services.

Zain Drone

We launched Zain Drone as-a-Service (DaaS) at GITEX, with the business set to unlock opportunities in various industries, offering state-of-the art bespoke drone solutions and advanced analytics for governments and businesses in an efficient, safe and fast manner. Zain Drone will focus on the Kuwait market initially and then expand to other key markets where it makes commercial sense to do so.

ZINC in Kuwait

Living our belief in innovation, we opened a Zain Innovation Center (ZINC) in Kuwait, located within the Zain Group head offices. This is the first facility to be located outside of the ultra-successful flagship ZINC in Jordan, featuring a co-working hub, a first-of-its-kind development in Kuwait provided by a corporate entity. The facility’s main aim is to bolster youth entrepreneurship and the country’s startup ecosystem. ZINC Kuwait is set to encourage young minds to think and act creatively outside of the norm in an open, supportive environment. Apart from the inspiring co-working hub facilities, ZINC will provide aspiring entrepreneurs and startups access to experts in various fields and advice from mentors from the region and across the globe, including Zain senior personnel and associated technology partners.

Omantel strategic relationship grows stronger

Following the completion of Omantel’s acquisition of Zain Group shares that brought its total holding to 21.9% at the end of 2017, both entities spent 2018 focusing on synergies and building on the creation of a new digital telecom powerhouse looking for opportunities to lead digital transformation across the MENA region. The scale and diversification of the partnership will result in the generation of incremental revenue and accelerated introduction of innovative products and services.

THE FLAGSHIP OPERATION IN KUWAIT IS A REGIONAL POWERHOUSE IN DIGITAL INNOVATION AS WELL AS ZAIN’S MOST PROFITABLE BUSINESS. WHAT WERE THE HOME MARKET HIGHLIGHTS IN 2018?

The operation in Kuwait provides us with a conducive platform for digital innovation in products and services that will be launched there, and that knowhow exported across our footprint. Kuwait also sets the foundation for the performance of the rest of the Group, and I am proud to report that 2018 was another year that the team’s successful efforts were punctuated by strong partnerships, digital innovation and market leadership in all key business facets at Zain Kuwait.

The Zain Life portfolio focused on the areas of Customer Experience, Smart Homes, and Digital Entertainment as Zain Kuwait continued in its transformation into a digital services provider in support of the New Kuwait 2035 Vision.

The operator launched BEAM, the advanced hi-speed wireless broadband technology, making us the first telco to offer this revolutionary technology in Kuwait. Zain Kuwait has made tremendous progress in 5G, with the operator being ready to go live with the state-of-the-art service across all heavily populated areas in Kuwait once devices become commercially available, which is expected in 2019.

Zain Kuwait launched zBot, the new face of smart customer services, making the operator the first telco to offer the interactive customer care solution in Kuwait. This customer service channel utilizes the latest artificial intelligence (AI) solutions to interact and respond to customer inquiries in a fully automated manner without the need for human interaction.

Zain Kuwait also launched eSIM services, an electronic SIM that replaces the traditional physical SIM card that is embedded in the device and allows customers to add up to 10 individual numbers on one device.

The operator entered into agreements with global entities, including Microsoft to provide innovative cloud solutions to enterprise customers; and with Cisco to deliver secure, cloud-based, managed network solutions to enterprises of all sizes; as well as with several other global entities to deploy Internet of Things (IoT) solutions.

Enhancing our customer’s digital lifestyle requirements, Zain Kuwait launched an exclusive Amazon Prime Video offer for the first time in the country, through which it provides customers with award-winning and popular movies and TV content.

Similarly, Zain Kuwait launched a gaming platform with DoCoMo Digital, allowing customers to enjoy more than 1,000 popular high-quality games on iOS, Android and Windows.

At the end of 2018, Zain Kuwait entered into an agreement with Zain Drone to undertake inspections of its tower infrastructure. The agreement, the first commercial deal for Zain Drone, demonstrates Zain Kuwait’s drive to become a more agile and cost-efficient operator by deploying drone technology to inspect and maintain its infrastructure through thorough tower inspection and maintenance.

In October, the operation enjoyed a strong presence at the annual GITEX conference in Dubai, the largest IT exhibition in the Middle East, where we showcased our capabilities as an active partner in achieving the goals of the Kuwait National Development Plan (New Kuwait 2035) introduced by His Highness the Amir, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Jaber Al Sabah. The vision is based on five expected outcomes and seven key pillars, and through the company’s booth at GITEX, Zain highlighted the technologies required under each of the seven pillars to achieve the goals of the Plan. These extend to Smart Security, Smart Education, Smart Health, Smart Mobility, Smart Living, Smart Economy, and Smart Infrastructure. During the show we showcased our latest innovative solutions for empowering a smart life, a safe community, and an efficient business sector.

ZAIN SAUDI ARABIA ENJOYED AN ESPECIALLY BUSY AND SUCCESSFUL 2018. WHAT WERE THE MAIN OPERATIONAL AND FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENTS THERE?

The team’s relentless turnaround efforts are bearing fruit, as our operation in Saudi Arabia experienced some incredibly positive milestones during the year, which boosted its financial and operational position in that market. This had a very positive affect on the Group on many levels, as evident in our financial results, to the appease of all stakeholders.

Zain Saudi Arabia recorded its best ever annual financial performance since inception in 2018, with several key financial indicators showing record growth levels, reflecting the successful implementation of the telco’s turnaround strategy. This landmark was achieved as the company celebrated a decade of commercial operation of mobile voice and data services in the Kingdom.

During the year we announced Zain Saudi Arabia had successfully refinanced and extended the maturity date of its syndicated SAR 5.9 billion (USD 1.57 billion) Murabaha facility for five years until 30 June 2023. Additionally, the agreement included a working capital facility of SAR 647 million (USD 172 million) for two years until 30 June 2020, bringing additional liquidity to Zain KSA to fund its digitally focused business growth plans.

We also revealed that due to the transfer of ownership of a quantity of Zain Saudi Arabia shares (on 23 July 2018) in Zain Group’s favor, and as a result of this step-up acquisition, Zain Saudi Arabia began to be treated as a subsidiary of Zain Group. An immediate consequence of this development was to have various key financial indicators of Zain Saudi Arabia’s financial results consolidated with the results of Zain Group commencing from the third quarter of 2018.

Towards the end of the year, the Board of Zain Saudi Arabia approved an offer to sell and leaseback the passive physical infrastructure of our mobile tower portfolio (over 8,100 sites) in the Kingdom for approximately SAR 2.43 billion (USD 648 million) to IHS, the largest independent tower operator in Europe, the Middle East and Africa by number of towers, and the third largest independent multinational tower company globally.

Under the terms of the agreement, Zain Saudi Arabia is selling only its passive, physical infrastructure and will retain its intelligent software, technology and intellectual property with respect to managing its network. The conditional agreement also involves a leaseback period of 15 years, with a five-year renewal option and building of an additional 1,500 towers over the next six years.

At the end of 2018 the company signed an agreement with the Kingdom’s Ministry of Finance (MOF), Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT), and Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) to consolidate the annual royalty fee for commercial service, reducing the tariff from 15% to 10% of net revenues retrospectively, commencing 1 January, 2018.

The expected financial impact of applying the unified annual royalty fees from 1 January, 2018 to 30 September, 2018 resulted in a decrease of fees amounting to SAR 220 million (USD 59 million), which reflected positively in the financial results announced thereafter by Zain Saudi Arabia.

Additionally, the agreement included the settlement of disputed amounts related to the payment of annual royalty fees by Zain Saudi Arabia to the CITC for the nine-year period between 2009 and 2017, under the condition that Zain invests further in expanding its infrastructure in addition to other conditions over the next three years. The expected financial impact of this settlement is forecast to reach SAR 1.7 billion (USD 453 million) over the next three years.

Given the abovementioned positive developments, the company is in a much stronger fiscal position that will only grow stronger. 2018 shall go down as a milestone for us and shall be looked back on many years from now as the year Zain Saudi Arabia truly came into its own.

WHAT WERE OTHER HIGHLIGHTS FROM KEY MARKETS IN 2018?

The revival of Iraq

One highlight that is pleasing all stakeholders is the revival and healthy growth of Zain Iraq , which had to deal with challenging social and economic conditions in recent years. With the improvement in social conditions, the team’s focus on driving business growth and restoration of numerous network sites notably in the West and North regions, as well as expansion of 3.9G network sites across the country saw the operation return to profitability. This is combined with numerous customer acquisition initiatives, especially in core regions, that has resulted in impressive customer additions. Another contributing factor to the operation’s financial revival was the significant growth of data revenues and robust growth in the Enterprise (B2B) segment.

Major financial institutions continued to show confidence in Zain Iraq with the IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, agreeing to provide a financing package worth USD 269 million to help reconstruct Iraq’s telecom operations and spur economic growth. The debt package includes USD 100 million from the IFC’s own account, and a further USD 169 million in mobilization. The financing helped Zain Iraq enhance its capacity as well as the quality of its 3G network, allowing the operator to expand coverage to unserved areas in the country. Zain Iraq was also able to modernize its networks and customer service in northern Iraq.

Sudan

Our team in Sudan continued to be a source of pride for us as the operator performed exceptionally well in local currency terms, despite the many socio-economic challenges in the country. Such is the importance of the market that I personally undertook a visit, holding a meeting with the President of the Republic of Sudan, His Excellency Mr. Omar Al-Bashir, during which I took the opportunity to brief the President on the developments taking place at Zain Sudan, and the numerous successes the company has scored over the years. I re-affirmed the confidence Zain Group has in the market and economy of Sudan, and pledged that the Group would continue to invest significantly in cutting-edge technology to provide the people of Sudan with the best communications services available.

Jordan

The challenging economic conditions and competitive telecom market of Jordan took its toll on the operator’s financials for the year. The team there are focused on transforming the operator on multiple levels and focusing heavily on expanding both its fiber and 4G networks across key parts of the country. This has resulted in immediate success with Zain Jordan reporting impressive take-up of new customers in both the household and enterprise segments. The operator is focused on offering home broadband packages geared towards increasing its market share in gaming, content, streaming apps, devices and IoT services.

The operator’s ZainCash offering is proving to be instrumental as its unique value proposition consisting of nationwide mobile coverage, an extensive agent network and ability to transfer instantly to individuals, is proving popular.

The economic conditions in Jordan have seen the government increase pressure on the telecom industry by the introduction of new taxes. We are lobbying heavily against the new draft law that imposes an increase of 3% income tax on telecom operators, 2% to individual and 1% as a “Solidarity tax” common to all companies. Zain has carried out an extensive action plan to raise awareness of the negative impact of such an increase. The plan includes appealing to the concerned regulators and government.

Bahrain

Celebrating its 15th year of operation in the Kingdom, Zain Bahrain team’s focus on operational efficiency and the delivery of state-of-the-art technology was evident by the profit increase the operator recorded. The team also focused on the offer of appealing innovative digital services that provide greater value to enterprise (B2B) and individual customers.

Catering for increased demand for high-speed and reliable connectivity solutions of business customers, Zain Bahrain joined the MEETS regional cable system to boost business offerings supporting the Kingdom of Bahrain's vision to become a major hub for ICT and data transmission in the MENA region.

Lebanon

Our managed operation touch performed the first commercial 5G trial in the country at an event presided over by the Prime Minister of Lebanon, His Excellency Saad Hariri. The demonstration was conducted over a period of two days with throughput speeds over the trial 5G network running at 100 times faster than current 4G LTE networks.

The groundbreaking trial formed part of touch’s progressive 5G implementation, which has seen the telco investing in the necessary infrastructure with the view to deploying live 5G sites in 2019.

Focused on digital innovation, the year saw touch heavily involved in numerous initiatives related to the local startup entrepreneurial ecosystem. The operator launched the touch Innovation Program (TIP) in partnership to support 12 startups in Lebanon through mentorship, workshops and introductions. touch also established its first co-working space at the touch Lab, which functions as a workspace catering to the independent worker, drawing freelancers, entrepreneurs, creatives, nomad workers and mobile employees.

ZAIN GROUP IS SYNONYMOUS WITH DIGITAL INNOVATION NOT ONLY FOR CUSTOMERS BUT ALSO WITHIN THE ORGANIZATION’S HUMAN TALENT. HOW DID ZAIN LEVERAGE INTERNAL INNOVATIONS DURING 2018?

Zain’s Human Resources strategy builds on the strength of the 6,000 talented workforce from across operations. Management believes that a diverse team is crucial to the success of the organization, helping Zain better understand and meet the needs of our customers, which is a critical aspect of our digital lifestyle aspirations.

We offer equal opportunities in all aspects of employment and advancement across all our operations. By identifying and sharing good practices, making best use of our talent pool, and by working with business partners, the company can accelerate growth and success.

To remain innovative and competitive we need to generate ideas from wherever we can find them and seeking them out internally is prudent. Accordingly, in recent years has been the tapping into Zain’s internal human resources to generate innovative ideas.

Zainiac

During 2018 we witnessed significant progress on Zainiac, an online platform and community for Zain Group employees. The platform allows employees across the Group to suggest innovative ideas, share challenges, and collaborate in a bid to achieve common goals.

The platform is an acknowledgement of the huge talent pool assembled within Zain Group, and aims to promote synergies among country operations, leveraging the benefits of crowd-sourcing of new ideas and business models. As part of the initiative, Zain organizes workshops with leading partners focusing on establishing and fostering startup competencies.

From the first cycle of entrepreneurial ideas submitted to Zainiac, three entries were chosen for further development of their value proposition.

The first initiative to be picked up for further development was Farhetna, from a touch Lebanon team member. It is a concept set to help newlyweds and their wedding guests in the collection and payment of money and gifts towards the wedding utilizing touch’s online and offline channels.

The second initiative was devised by a talented team in Zain Bahrain, called FindurSeat. It is a bilingual, web-based education platform aimed at students in the Middle East to help them search and apply to different academic institutions as well as finding scholarships in an efficient manner

The third, Zain Jordan team’s idea, ZGiving, is aimed at employees and accessible via the human resources application, to enable donations towards needy colleagues. The plan is to introduce the platform in phases across all operations, starting in Jordan.

ZAIN HAS BEEN TARGETING THE ENTERPRISE (B2B) SECTOR FOR SOME YEARS NOW. WHAT SUCCESSES DID YOU ENJOY IN THIS AREA IN 2018?

Zain continues to strengthen its positioning as the operator-of-choice for connectivity services to governments and companies of all sizes across the Middle East. B2B is one of the most dynamic and innovative areas, and is a growth engine for many key operations. Our ongoing focus on developing innovative value propositions and offering a superior customer experience to enterprise customers delivered strong revenue growth in 2018.

We are addressing the ICT needs of governments and companies across our footprint with a comprehensive suite of mobile, fixed, IoT, IT security and cloud services; building end-to-end solutions to grow our B2B businesses. Our operations serve the entire spectrum of customers, from Small Office, Home Office (SoHo) companies to large corporations and government entities with dedicated B2B units. We also continue to invest in our customer-facing staff and capabilities and expanded the key account manager teams, the Zain B2B shop-inshop locations, and after-sales care teams.

To ensure future success, in October 2018 we held our fourth annual B2B conference, gathering senior representatives from across operations to discuss developments in this important area and to brainstorm on ways the Group can continue to leverage its impressive experience, innovation, and infrastructure to maximize returns.

Some of B2B milestones in 2018 included the roll-out of the Zain Business brand across Zain markets; the successful implementation of the MEW project in Kuwait to connect 880,000 smart meters to a central IT platform and billing system; and smart meter projects in Jordan, Iraq and Bahrain. During the year we also expanded of our fixed, data and voice offers to reach all B2B segments, launched IT security services in Jordan, and introduced a dedicated B2B self-service app in Saudi Arabia.

Other achievements included the introduction of innovative leased line services over LTE, and an IoT managed SIM platform empowering customers to manage their IoT SIMs in Saudi Arabia. We also unveiled international VPN services in Kuwait, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, allowing enterprises and governments to connect through Zain’s international MPLS network to branches abroad. Lastly, we opened a new data center in Kuwait, serving the local market with co-location, disaster recovery, cloud and data center managed services

HOW DID THE REGULATORY ENVIRONMENT ACROSS ZAIN’S FOOTPRINT DEVELOP IN 2018?

Telecommunications markets in Zain’s footprint in the MENA region and beyond, witnessed major moves by National Regulatory Authorities (NRA). This was evident from the critical relevance and extent of public consultations initiated; the high impact of regulatory final determinations and decisions made; spectrum auctions completed; and new licensing frameworks, laws and regulations either adopted or promulgated. Regulatory developments spanned several broad areas including 5G, IoT, spectrum, infrastructure sharing, data protection and privacy, digital services, competition safeguards and industry costs.

Some of these moves have been made to facilitate digital transformation or to support infrastructure development or to attempt to create a more level playing field in markets where a dominant incumbent controls essential facilities such as inter-city fibre networks

Zain welcomes and supports the approach by regulators of launching public consultation processes as these not only help to notify operators in advance of the intentions of the government; they also provide an opportunity for a multi-sided exchange of ideas amongst industry stakeholders as well as participation in the drafting of legislation.

ZAIN GROUP CONTINUES TO BE A PIONEER WITH RESPECT TO GENDER EQUALITY. WHAT WERE SOME OF THE MAJOR DEVELOPMENTS IN THIS AREA IN 2018?

I firmly believe that championing gender diversity at Zain will create competitive differentiation, fast-track our strategic ambitions of unlocking the tremendous growth opportunities in the digital arena while at the same time improving the company’s bottom line. To drive it forward, we created a new senior position within the organization, namely Chief Inclusion and Diversity Officer, to drive empowerment initiatives that define, enhance and continue to cultivate an equitable work environment within all Zain operations.

Much of the success of Zain’s Women Empowerment program lies in the support it receives from the very highest levels within Zain management. The initiative is part of the Zain Group strategy, and its action planning and tracking is measured through quarterly senior management operations review.

The program has already scored major successes in raising the profile of women in the organization, with Zain working towards increasing female leadership positions from 14.5% to 25% by 2020; and ultimately evolving towards a gender diverse workforce.

Since the initiative’s official launch in November 2017, it has achieved the following accomplishments:

Female leadership, director and above at Zain Group has grown from 14.5% to 15.5% in one year

Female recruitment into Zain across all operations grew from 21% of total recruitment to 29%

The number of women at Chief level increased from 6 to 11, an 83% increase

33 high potential female leaders have been identified to form the Centered Leaders program

61 Women Empowerment ambassadors have been onboarded and tasked with action planning

Zain signed up to the UN Women Empowerment Principles and communicated this to all employees

Introduced a Women Empowerment communications app with 300 employees already using it

Women Empowerment embedded into the agenda of the Board of Directors and placed on CEO scorecards

Two talented women from Zain operations were sponsored to attend MBA programs at ESADE, Barcelona

Embracing working mothers

As a Group-wide initiative at the end of 2018, we introduced one of the most progressive and innovative human resources policies in the region, providing female employees who become new mothers with four months of paid maternity leave, with a flexible schedule for returning to work. The introduction of flexible working models was also introduced including six-hour-day work weeks for mothers with children up to four years old and an optional compressed working week enabling working mothers to work more hours over a compressed week to avail one day off.

This flexible work program will complement Zain Group’s recruitment, retention and development efforts, as the company shows itself to be one in tune with the needs of female employees to balance their careers with their family responsibilities.

WHAT EFFORTS DID ZAIN GROUP UNDERTAKE TO ATTRACT AND MAINTAIN HUMAN TALENT AT THE COMPANY IN 2018?

We kicked off another year of our ‘Generation Z 2’ program for six high-achieving Kuwaiti graduates, who were selected to enter the program following a rigorous assessment process. The latest program builds on previous year-long graduate programs that started in 2016, which have seen four graduates from each of the previous years offered full-time employment at Zain.

This initiative has matured into one that is genuinely making a difference to the prospects and experience of talented young Kuwaitis in enhancing their digital skill sets. Investment in and development of young people is the most prudent long-term plan an organization or nation can make, and we are delighted with the caliber of individuals who are graduating from Generation Z on an annual basis.

The six new successful candidates for the 2019 program were judged on their creativity, passion, resilience and initiative. The aim of the year-long graduate development program is to develop young Kuwaiti nationals with potential, and enhance their digital skill sets to the level required to support Zain Group’s expanding digital lifestyle strategy.

The incoming flexible work program for mothers discussed above complements the company’s recruitment and retention efforts, as the telco shows itself to be an organization in tune with the needs of all employees to balance careers with family responsibilities.

ZAIN HAS ALWAYS BEEN A CORNERSTONE OF THE COMMUNITIES IT SERVES. WHAT WERE SOME OF THE IMPACTFUL PROGRAMS UNDERTAKEN IN 2018?

The Group maintained efforts to advance its sustainability agenda and set in place key performance indicators to help develop a more structured and measured approach for all its markets. We further aligned initiatives across operations to widely recognized norms and social guidelines, aligning efforts to those already established by the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Many examples of our efforts are detailed inside the Corporate Sustainability section of this annual report.

Early in the year we announced the publication of our seventh annual sustainability report, entitled ‘Together Everyone Achieves More’. The publication of the report reinforced Zain Group’s reputation as one of the most visible community development-oriented companies in the region, with the content highlighting the benefits of shared value creation.

The report was available exclusively online through an interactive interface that is user-friendly, and which minimized the company’s environmental impact.

The global spread of mobile technology has elevated society’s expectations and demands for an accessible, user-friendly, fast, and effective tool for conducting financial transactions.

The publication of our annual thought leadership report in 2018 was entitled, ‘Saving Lives by Empowering People through Zain Cash’. With its broad scope, rich portfolio and wide range of services, Zain Cash responds to these needs as it plays an instrumental role in empowering individuals by providing everyone with a smartphone with access to safe and reliable mobile financial services.

The report launched during the 2018 Mobile World congress in Barcelona, showcases how Zain Cash, a dynamic and life enhancing mobile banking service, transforms people’s lives, particularly those of the most vulnerable in society. The report draws much of its primary data from examples found in Iraq, with NGOs and humanitarian aid agencies being key Zain Cash users.