Ethio telecom has completed its first round of advanced 4G LTE network expansion in over 16 regions over the country, however Tigray has been left back due to the situation, announced the CEO.
In its latest expansion, Ethio telecom upgraded the West West region, launching the advanced 4G LTE service on September 30, 2021 in an event held in Assosa at Semhal Hotel. In the West West Region, specifically Assosa, Bambasi, and Gilgel Beles towns including the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam where high mobile data traffic has been observed were the beneficiaries of the network expansion.
As part of its competitive strategy for the coming telecom competition on February 22, 2021 Ethio telecom had announced its first 4G LTE Advanced network expansion in the south eastern region for six towns and ever since in the last 8 months Ethio telecom has reached 16 regions and 92 towns where there is high mobile data traffic and surge in demand.
“The service covers areas with a high demand for speedy internet,” emphasized Frehiwot Tamru, CEO of Ethio telecom. “The network expansions will enable and empower customers to digitize their services, increase productivity and improve their experience,” Frehiwot stated.
Despite the plan being to reach 106 towns, as the CEO said due to the current situation in the country the first round has stopped on 92, yet about 71 new 4G LTE advanced network infrastructures would be introduced to improve network availability as the data traffic growth and demand from customers for the 4G/LTE have been increasing. “Our company is immensely working on phase -II network upgrade and expansion in association with the ever-growing data demands,” said the CEO
LTE Advanced mobile service is one of the latest mobile technologies providing reliable connections enriching customers’ experience with exceptional speed to download or upload large-sized data, high-definition (HD) multimedia, live streaming and video conferencing in real-time.
ZTE, Huawei, and Ericsson has participated in the expansion of the network as strategic partners of Ethio telecom.
Ethio telecom which is preparing for the coming competition has also for its partial privatization floated expression of interest.
Through it all, Ethio-Telecom has been working hard to become a competent and preferred telecom service provider in the fast and dynamic telecom market to meet the growing demand for telecom services. Currently there are about 54 million customers of Ethio telecom, it has also planned to increase its total subscribers by 14% to 64 million customers while also planning to reach Data and Internet users by 16.2% to 28.5million users.
