OTE has set in operation its new cable infrastructure of fiberoptics that will offer high-capacity data transmission in the Balkans. Its subsidiary, OTE Globe announced yesterday the start of operation of its TransBalkan Network (TBN), which is the new international infrastructure of the OTE network for covering increased broadband needs in the Balkans. The TBN is the company’s second high-speed private fiberoptic network. At a total cost of 50 million euros, the network creates an alternative route to the cable system linking Greece with Italy. TBN stretches from Greece to Frankfurt, through the Balkans and central Europe, at transmission speeds from 34 Mbps to 10 Gbps and is exclusively land-based.

Greece’s largest refiner, Hellenic Petroleum (HELPE), said yesterday its chief executive officer Panos Cavoulacos resigned and was replaced by former Petrola CEO Ioannis Costopoulos. “Panos Cavoulacos handed in his resignation... at today’s board meeting,” the company said in a statement. Costopoulos was an executive member of the board of HELPE, coming from the Latsis group that owned Petrola, which in 2003 merged with HELPE. Timos Christodoulou remains president of the company, being the state’s representative on the board. (Reuters, Kathimerini)

Cyprus’s gross domestic product expanded by 4.6 percent year-on-year in the third quarter, and an estimated 4.4 percent over the first nine months of 2007, the statistics department said yesterday. Financial services showed a 30.5 percent increase in output, tourism revenue came in 11.1 percent higher and there was a 32.1 percent increase in the registration of motor vehicles year-on-year, it said. Quarter-on-quarter, GDP growth in Q3 was 1.2 percent, up from 1.0 percent in the second quarter. (Reuters)

Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries Co Ltd, an affiliate of Hyundai Heavy Industries Co Ltd, won a $450 million order to build three container ships for Greek shipping line Danaos Corp, a Hyundai Heavy official said yesterday. The official at the world’s top shipbuilder told Reuters that Hyundai Samho planned to deliver the vessels by March 2011. (Reuters)

The Carrefour-Marinopoulos supermarket group is next Monday opening the first “social grocery store” in Greece, in association with the City of Athens and the Foundation for the Homeless. It will sell 2,000 basic products for poor families only at a 90 percent discount compared with prices in other stores of the same chain.