Telecom Egypt has settled its dispute with Etisalat Misr and described the development as "a mark of the end of all disputes with all mobile operators" in the North African country.

The dispute with Etisalat was over international call services rendered by Telecom Egypt to 13 June 2017 and the amount of money owed.

Ahmed El Beheiry, Telecom Egypt's Managing Director and CEO said the settlement represents the beginning of a new phase for the telco.

"We are pleased to reach a final settlement with Etisalat Misr as we embark on a new era, where we are mitigating uncertainty and risk, while cleaning our balance sheet to ensure smooth financial performance in the future. The new phase also emphasises on the importance of partnership as the key to secure ongoing cooperation with all mobile operators."

Telecom Egypt will pay US$48m to Etisalat Misr to mitigate the risk of a potential loss of more than US$100m according to the settlement.

In November 2017 Telecom Egypt and Orange Egypt jointly announced they had reached a settlement over a dispute relating to interconnection, leased lines and international services between 2008 and October 2017.

Jean Marc Harion, CEO of Orange Egypt said Orange believed that agreement, which remains in place, was in the best interests of Orange Egypt's shareholders as it resolved all outstanding disputes and removed the uncertainty and distraction of prolonged litigations.

El Beheiry added at the time, "We are pleased with the resolution of our dispute and the settlement achieved, which was enabled by the mutual cooperation between Telecom Egypt and Orange. This marks the complete resolution of the longstanding legal disputes with Orange. The settlement agreement strengthens our collaboration and paves the way to the framework we will agree on in the future. We look forward to expanding our business relationship with Orange."

Three weeks ago Telecom Egypt announced that its budget for the 2018 financial year had been approved by its board of directors.

Budget highlights include a forecast of total revenue growth in the range of "high single digit to low double digit" as well as EBITDA margin in the mid-to-high twenties and CAPEX to sales ratio of 30%.