Eight satellite operators have shared the 13 new licenses for the provision of telecom services awarded by the NCC. This figure brings to 68 the licenses already issued by the regulator since January 2020. A solution that will respond to the poor telecom coverage in rural areas.

The Communications Commission of Nigeria (NCC) has awarded thirteen new licenses to provide telecom services via satellite to foreign companies. The new licenses are shared between Intelsat, Eutelsat, Avanti, Yahsat, SES via its British subsidiary NSS New Skies, Inmarsat, Iridium. Even OneWeb, which declared bankruptcy a few months ago, is on the list of new satellite licensees in Nigeria.

With these new licenses, it is a total of 68 authorizations for the provision of telecoms services by satellite that the NCC will have delivered approximately to the same companies in the space of nine months. In January, 55 licenses had already been shared between Eutelsat, Intelsat, OneWeb, Yahsat, Immarsat, NSS Licensee BV and Avanti. The American company Intelsat had managed to have 24 licenses on its own against 10 licenses each for Eutelsat and NSS Licensee BV

While for satellite operators, obtaining these licenses will help strengthen their activities in the Nigerian telecoms market, which currently has nearly 180 million subscribers to telecom services for a population of nearly 205 million individuals, for the telecoms regulator is a strategy to reach more people and break the digital divide.

Indeed, even if Nigeria has 180 million subscribers to telecom services, the regulator is aware that this figure is inflated by holders of two or even three SIMs. A large part of the population, especially those in rural areas, remains deprived of telecom services. The telephone operators have always been somewhat reluctant to invest in these areas given the high cost. Satellite is therefore an effective alternative.

Source: Agence Ecofin