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MTN SA's Chief Technology Officer Kanagaratnam Lambotharan (image source: file photo) |
South Africa’s second largest mobile operator, MTN plans to roll out over 1 000 Universal Mobile Telecommunications Systems (UMTS) base stations in rural areas for the next two years.
MTN plans to bring the much-needed broadband capacity to millions of its subscribers in the country and its operations across the continent and the Middle East. The company has made significant broadband investments in the West Africa Cable System (WACS), and in the East Africa Cable System (EASSy) undersea cables.
“The key limitations to rolling out infrastructure however remain the availability of high capacity transmission and in some cases grid power, which requires additional investment from telecoms players such as MTN.”
“As a company with operations in emerging markets, the availability of reliable energy sources in rolling and maintaining a reliable network is crucial.
“The unavailability of reliable energy supplies makes network rollout very expensive, thus dissuading potential investors from investing,” says Lambotharan.
