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IDC urges telecoms operators to improve services

By BusinessNews Staff on July 13, 2014

The International Data Corporation has called on operators and government agencies to address the unacceptable levels of services quality plaguing the telecoms sector.

The IDC, Saturday Punch learnt on Thursday, took this step after weighing up the Nigeria Communication Commission’s latest strategy for bringing offending operators into line.

Cellular-news.com reported that the IDC was also assessing the deeper issues involved in achieving true quality of service.

From just 400,000 lines in 2001, Nigeria’s mobile market has grown to 120 million users today, with mobile phone penetration reaching 87 per cent of the population.

But poor quality of services remains the bane of the nation’s telecommunications industry, with all four mobile network operators falling foul of the regulator at various times over the years.

In February, Airtel, Globacom, and MTN were handed month-long bans from selling SIM cards and were also suspended from engaging in any promotional activity until their QoS levels reached the required standards.

However, the IDC asked if such stringent measures as handing the bans and suspension on operators would finally have the desired effect.

“Banning sales of SIM cards is a new hammer for the regulatory body, and one it has introduced in an attempt to compel operators to comply with its stated QoS standards,” Telecommunications and Networking Research Analyst with IDC West Africa, Mr. Oluwole Babatope, said.

He said, “Fines and limitations on marketing activities were the traditional sanctions of choice for the NCC, so this latest action marks a significant shift in thinking.

“However, IDC believes the ban on selling SIM cards will likely be as ineffective as the previous tactics because there is much more to enabling effective QoS than mere input or effort from the operator side.”

Cellular-news.com, quoted Babatope as saying “Another critical factor is security, with numerous reports over the last two years of widespread and persistent vandalism of fibre cables, theft of diesel generators from cell sites, and destruction of fibre cables destruction during road construction.”

Babatope argued that the way forward was for the government to protect rather than persecute the sector of the economy.

He said the telecommunications vertical in Nigeria had consistently increased its contribution to the Gross Domestic Product over recent years, rising from about two per cent in 2006 to eight percent in 2013.

“As such, it is in the government’s interests to create and implement policies that provide an enabling environment for communication service providers. Indeed, laws should be established that protect telecommunications infrastructure and prosecute the vandals and individuals who sabotage telecom operations in the country,” he said.

The IDC research analyst, however, said, none of this absolved the operators of all responsibility. “IDC is also of the opinion that operators must invest more in hybrid power solutions.”

He said it was common knowledge that the supply of public electricity was unreliable and would likely remain a significant challenge for some time to come.

“Operators should therefore be proactive in seeking out cost-effective alternatives for power generation.

“Hybrid power solutions, which combine renewable and non-renewable energy sources, should help reduce operational expenditure on networks, thereby enabling the operators to invest more in their networks across the country and ultimately improve the customer experience,” he added.

[Punch]

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