 The initial group of shareholders was led by Portuguese investment bank Banco Espírito Santo, Portuguese conglomerate Amorim and USA's Pacific Telesis, owner of mobile operator PacTel Cellular.PacTel Cellular was spun off in 1994 as AirTouch, which in turn merged in 1999 with British operator Vodafone.Thus, Telecel became minority-owned by the Vodafone Group.