Etisalat, United Arab Emirate’s (UAE) mobile operator, says, in the last five years, it has invested an estimated $1 billion into its operations in Nigeria, Africa’s largest economy.
This is even amid the country’s harsh business environment, which has negative impact on revenues and profitability.These investments, according to the telecommunications company has been ploughed into network upgrades,infrastructure roll outs, capacity building, among others.
Speaking at the launch of a new campaign programme on Mobile Number Portability (MNP), Mattew Wilsher, acting chief executive officer, Etisalat Nigeria, said, weekend, that the telecommunications firm currently has over 19 million subscribers with keen aspirations of doubling the figure in no distant time. Wilsher said the firm is keen on improving on the current quality of the network but added that there numerous operating challenges such as multiple taxation and regulation, vandalism, power constraints, amongst others, were hindering operators’ from doing so.
The Acting CEO said: “Etisalat is new in Nigeria, just five and half years with about $1 billion investments and more coming. We have over 19 million subscribers.” Wilsher, who said the firm is on the verge of completing a 2800 kilometres back haul network infrastructure, informed that Etisalat’s current base transceiver stations is 4500 spread across the country.
Speaking on the MNP process, which was introduced in Nigeria April 2013, Wilsher commended the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for the initiative, stressing the process has provided subscribers with the freedom of choice.
According to him, the multi SIM (Subcriber Identity Module) nature of the country is impacting on the process greatly, but “I can stress that there has been huge explosion in porting in Nigeria. Porting has become very easy now and this is good for customers.” Speaking in the same vein, Idowu Adesokan, head of marketing and high value proposition at Etisalat, informed that the porting process has favoured Etisalat more than competition. According to him, before the launch of MNP in the country, Etisalat had 15.3 million subscribers, “but now we have over 19 million subscribers.
“I can say that we have 45 per cent port-in and between nine and 10 per cent port out. This has brought huge confidence on the network.”While calling for the protection of ICT (Information Communications Technology) infrastructure in the country, Wilsher said vandalisation impact negatively on the infrastructure of all mobile operators, “but we at Etisalat respond quickly to restore our operations.
We still share infrastructure, but done sensibly and strategically.
Ben Uzor Jr
