WAITING FOR 5G SERVICES

 In spite of the hype, there is little evidence of availability of services, writes Sonny Aragba-Akpore

Year 2001 and 2021 are 20 years apart. Both years have history separating them. While 2001 was the year of telecommunications revolution when Digital Mobile Licenses (DML) were awarded thus changing the narrative of “telephone is not for the poor”, 2021 tried to outdo 2001 principally to massage some personality egos. And so Nigeria joined a race it knew very little about and expected to win big. There was excitement in government circles about the life abundance that the fifth generation technology (5G) was likely to offer. Nearly two years after, that race appears to be against the wind.

 Hypes visited the licensing process and awards of 5G licenses in Nigeria. Then Minister, the regulator preached sermons of the value and excitement that 5G will add to the country. There was so much energy deployed to the campaign on what to come and the beauty of the technology.

   Unsuspecting Nigerians joined in the excitement. Licences were awarded on December 21, 2021 to MTN Nigeria and a little known Mafab Communications. They had a roll out timeline of August 2022 but the regulator granted an extension of five months to Mafab Communications to get ready. Thus the regulator changed the rules in between the game thus sending the first signal that all was not well.

MTN tried to weather the storm despite the challenges (even when it will not admit it openly) and “launched” a semblance of 5G services in parts of Nigeria. But that is where the excitement stops. Airtel, a late arrival shows some promises as we wait.

And so, the hype built around 5G has left everyone including the operators and regulators speechless as there is very little tangible evidence of availability of services so far. We have now accepted our fate as the wait goes on.

 By December 21, 2023, it will be two years when the noise about 5G started in Nigeria. There are so far, three supposed operators for the services: MTN Nigeria, Mafab Communications and Airtel Nigeria but as things stand today, the noise has died down as Nigerians await in their various corners for the much talked about 5G services.

 On June 19, 2023, the last of the three to acquire the 5G licence, Airtel, kicked off its fifth generation network rollout in four locations, Lagos, Ogun, Rivers and Abuja, and the firm,  is targeting coverage of the entire country by the end of the current financial year.

Airtel said for anyone to enjoy the innovative service, the subscriber must have a 5G compatible device and be within coverage area. The service provider explained that it unveiled a non-standalone version, which it described as being far better in service delivery. Its claim is yet to be verified as the operator promised its subscribers speed of up to 100 times faster than 4G, ultra-low latency and increased network capacity.

 This launch came six months after Airtel acquired a 100MHz of spectrum in the 3500MHz band and 2x5MHz of 2600MHz spectrum from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for $316.7 million.

 With 60 million subscribers in Nigeria accounting for 27 per cent market shares as at April, on its GSM network, Airtel explained that it would use the purchase to improve the quality of its 4G network, and launch 5G properly.

 Airtel Nigeria boss, Carl Cruz, said the 5G revolution is a quantum leap from 4G, stressing that though the latter is remarkable, 5G opens a new vista. We agree.

  Life is definitely going to get more interesting and easier, he boasted. “We can only be limited by the limit of our imagination,” Cruz told his audience at the launch. The Airtel chief said with 5G, there would be more collaboration among stakeholders in the telecoms space to do new things with Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Internet of Things, Smart Cities, among others. He commended the NCC for creating the opportunity for Nigeria to join the first 60 countries to roll out the service adding, “Airtel Nigeria is proud to be an early mover with 5G technology, not just in Africa, but all over the world. Thanks to the commitment of the Nigerian government, 5G became a reality early in Nigeria, when only about 60 countries had access worldwide. In addition to that, the frequency spectrum band allocated to 5G will make the experience more worthwhile for consumers.”

 Airtel Nigeria said it wants to make 5G accessible and widespread in the country and to ensure more Nigerians have access to the technology as the firm offers its router for N30,000, in partnership with a major equipment vendor to deliver its services at near pocket friendly prices. He said though 5G is positioned to consume more data because it enables more speed and latency, “the rate and prices of data will remain the same.”

 And contrary to bookmakers’ predictions, Mafab Communications which won 5G licence alongside MTN in December 2021, announced a soft launch of its 5G network in Abuja and Lagos, late January 2023 with claims that it has also launched in four other cities and assured Nigerians of super high speed internet connectivity for data service as well as seamless voice service.

 But strangely, six months after, not much has been heard about its services in the cities it claimed the services were available. Although Mafab Communications appears to be a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) specifically arranged to bid for the license in 2021, paying the license fees was a big plus for it but that appears to be where the excitement ends as eager subscribers await the much talked about fast speeds and clean voice communication on its network.

 Mafab claims it will be offering voice and data services from day one of its rollout, stressing that it will ride on an existing telecom company to rollout its services to Nigerians on the 5G infrastructure and will continue to expand as the market grows. But some Nigerians are skeptical about the capacity of Mafab to rollout 5G, without a visible telecom infrastructure.

 Analysts say “Mafab is not a known telecom operator and has no subscriber base like other established telecom operators in the country. There are no visible offices across the country and customer care service centres where intending subscribers could go and make enquiry about their services in order to sign up on its network”.

 It is not clear who their technical partners are but it will be interesting to know its roll out plans after getting a five month extension to begin services granted to it by industry regulator, NCC in August 2022 and the number of customer centres it currently has across the country.

 Not much has been heard from the company since January 2023 when it carried out a soft launch in Abuja and Lagos.

 “We became the first mobile network operator to launch a 5G network in Nigeria, providing coverage in key cities in the six geopolitical regions. Since its commercial launch in September 2022, we have rolled out 588 sites and brought the 5G network to 5G-enabled smartphones, starting with iPhone users” were the words of MTN Chief Executive, Karl Toriola, in a report unveiled by MTN recently.

 Since its 5G launch in Nigeria last September, it has rolled out 588 sites across leading cities in the country. “We accelerated the coverage and capacity of our 4G network in response to the rising data traffic, bringing 4G population coverage to 79.1 per cent (up by 8.7 per cent). 4G traffic now constitutes 79.5 per cent (up by 9.7 per cent) of the total traffic on our network,” Toriola added.

 The report noted that MTN managed to add 7.2 million Nigerian subscribers in 2022, an increase of 10.5 per cent to 75.6 million, despite the telco having to drop millions of users, who had not properly adhered to the country’s SIM card registration process. The adoption of the Fifth Generation (5G) network is fast expanding as MTN disclosed that it has activated over 700 sites across 13 cities since its launch in August 2022. Connected cities, according to MTN, include Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Kano, Owerri, Ibadan, Maiduguri, Abeokuta, Ife, Warri, Enugu, and Ifo. On the journey so far, MTN Nigeria’s Chief Technical Officer, Mohammed Rufai, said Nigerians are currently enjoying the benefits of 5G.

 Rufai justified that Nigeria was ready for the technology, saying the capacity has always been there in terms of the availability of the spectrum, fibre infrastructure, market and technical know-how. He disclosed that 5G would not only complement the country’s broadband target of 70 per cent penetration by 2025 but also ensure that telecoms services expand to remote areas.  Although MTN wants to deepen 5G adoption, it admits that devices, especially mobile, for the technology, are still not much in the market, while smartphones prices are exorbitant, but customers could still enjoy the benefits of the technology through fixed wireless infrastructure, saying there are 5G routers that people can get and connect to WiFi.

Beautiful as 5G is, there are indeed bottlenecks, but only honest network providers will admit this.

Aragba-Akpore is a member of THISDAY Editorial Board