Orange Workers Dodge Islamic State Forces to Keep Network Up

About 100 sites out of 3,000 aren’t working at any one time in Iraq because forces from the Islamic State, a militant Sunni Muslim group, have made it too dangerous to go near them.

Orange owns about 20 percent of Iraqi phone company Korek Telecom as part of a joint venture. Still, Orange’s African and Middle Eastern business is a source of growth for the company, which has been struggling with declining sales from weak economies and price wars in its European markets. Sales in the region grew 9 percent to 1.1 billion euros ($1.4 billion) last quarter. That compared to a 4.2 percent decline in France, its largest market. Individually, Mali’s revenue jumped 36 percent while Guinea rose 57 percent in the second quarter. The markets are growing fast as people adopt mobile phones and start using smartphones and wireless Internet access for the first time. Companies like Orange are also in a position to sell additional services such as mobile banking in Africa.