About our History

More than 155 years of accumulated experience within telecommunications, coupled with a pioneering spirit and a quest for knowledge and development – are what have brought Telenor to where it is today. Telenor Group has mobile operations in 11 markets around the world and in additionally 19 markets through our 31,67 per cent ownership in VimpelCom Ltd. Go ahead and explore our history – in text, film and pictures.

View the Telenor History

Duration: 5:01

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1989

1989 (Photo: Studio MPM/Corbis/SCANPIX)

Televerket develops new international fixed network services in 1989.
Photo: Studio MPM/Corbis/SCANPIX

  • Development of international fixed network services begin.
  • Norwegian Telecom develops international business in accordance with customer needs.

1988

1988 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

TBK (Televerket's Company Communications) was established in 1988.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • The market for telecommunications terminals is opened up to competition.
  • Norwegian Telecom’s monopoly over the sale of telephone sets ends.

1985

1985 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

The Vega 3 Satellite ensures transmissions from Swedish TV channels.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1985 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

The master transmitter at Trolltind in Troms.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1985 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

The Tryvannstårnet TV Tower was built in 1962 to send broadcasting signals to radio and TV transmitters across the whole of Norway.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1985d (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Typical manual exchange at Jessheim, Norway.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1985 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Researcher Odd Trandem shows off the world's first GSM telephone, a prototype placed in a carrier (1985).
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Automation of the Norwegian telecommunications network is completed.
  • The last manual telephone exchange is shut down in Balsfjord, Norway.
  • Satellite transmissions of the Swedish TV-channels 1 and 2 begin.

1984

1984 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Televerket's Christmas present to Svalbard in 1984: direct TV broadcasting.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Norwegian Telecom starts its field trials for television transmissions to Svalbard sent via satellite.
  • Svalbard receives directly transmitted television via satellite.

1981

1981 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Siemens advertisement: a handy suitcase containing a ‘mini office with a phone’.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1981 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Advertisement for the Simonsen AMT-10 mobile telephone (1981): this model was practical, robust and watertight!
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1981 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Televerket's (Norwegian Telecom) advertisement for fax services (1981): Send letters in just three minutes.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • The mobile telephone is automated, and NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony) is launched.
  • The telefax is introduced in Norway.

1980

1980 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Advertisement for NMT 450 mobile telephone, Simonsen AMT 10 from 1981. This was produced in seven different models in Norway between 1981 and 1985.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Standards for interconnecting the services are developed.
  • The 1980s see a period of cooperation with international partners in creating technical solutions such as satellite services, the NMT 450 (Nordic Mobile Telephony) and GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) mobile systems.

1979

1979 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Queue at a telephone box at Furuset, Oslo (1978).
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Telephone connection to Svalbard via satellite opens.
  • 94,000 names are on the waiting list for a phone subscription. Norwegian Telecom is not able to meet the demand for regular phone subscriptions.

1976

1976 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Minister of Transport and Communications, Ragnar Christensen, opens the Norsat satellite connection by ringing the Ekofisk oil field via satellite in 1976.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Norwegian Telecom opens satellite connection from the mainland to oil installations in the North Sea.

1975

1975 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Ekofisk oil field: satellite services are used by the Norwegian oil industry from the mid-1970s.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1975 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

Televerket's (Norwegian telecom) standard telephone set from 1980 was extremely popular.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

1975 (Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum)

An advertisement for satellite telephony from 1975.
Photo: Norwegian Telecom Museum

  • Collaboration with partners to create and manage international services.
  • Satellite services are developed in close cooperation with Norwegian industry.
  • Satellite services are utilized by the offshore oil industry, the Norwegian shipping industry and in the polar region, Spitsbergen, Svalbard.