A City of London-based mobile company, a mobile virtual network operator on the EE network, aimed at people who call abroad.
Lyca Mobile, also written Lycamobile, is a mobile company that sells pay-as-you-go international SIM cards. It is a mobile virtual network operator, meaning it leases capacity from established operators instead of owning its own masts. In the UK, Wikipedia names EE as its network partner. The company operates in 18 countries, so the UK business is part of a much larger international group, with customers who often call family and friends overseas.
Lyca Mobile was founded in September 2006 by Allirajah Subaskaran, a British-based entrepreneur born in Sri Lanka, who chairs the company. Wikipedia reports that it passed 15 million customers by 2016. We could not find a mission statement or a list of values on the pages we read. The group's wider activities give some idea of its character: it has run Lyca Radio and Lyca Gold stations, an online entertainment service called Lyca TV, and it took over the format of the former Sunrise Radio, with programming aimed at South Asian communities.
The group is headquartered in the United Kingdom and Sri Lanka, and Wikipedia says the UK staff worked from a headquarters in the City of London. This entry covers only the UK business. Wikipedia noted a reduction in UK staffing at the end of 2024, which suggests that the UK team is now small and that much of the group's activity happens elsewhere. We recommend checking the company's website for the current position rather than relying on this older figure.
Culture is not described in the sources we read. Roles in a mobile virtual network operator typically cover marketing and community outreach, retail and distribution partnerships, customer care, finance, regulatory and compliance, and technology links with the host network. Because the customer base is international, languages and cultural understanding are likely to matter in many of those roles. That is our reasoning, not a company claim.
We have not researched entry routes. If you are interested in this type of business, a useful first step is to see how the company markets itself in local shops and communities, and to look at the careers page on its website. Learning how wholesale mobile deals work is also a good way to build knowledge for interviews in the wider telecoms sector.
Website: www.lycamobile.co.uk
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