• pumps $2b into network expansion
• introduces new tariff proposition
Ben Uzor Jr
Steve Evans, chief executive officer, Etisalat Nigeria has disclosed recently that the mobile phone company had crossed the five million line subscription mark within 22 months of entry into Nigeria’s highly competitive telecommunications market. According to him, the company intends to invest $2 billion in network expansion in order to address the issue of network congestion.
Furthermore, Etisalat Nigeria has introduced a new tariff proposition that allows that allows subscribers enjoy lower rates of 25 kobo per second for voice calls from a peak of 50 kobo per second. The new plan called ‘easylife’ is designed to provide Nigerians with more opportunities to talk to friends and family, acquaintances and associates, business partners and colleagues, across the nation.
“Etisalat is proud to contribute its part to ensuring that the voice of the Nigerian spirit is heard loud and clear in all corners of the world in this season of Nigerians’ Golden Jubilee.” He said that the network now has over 1500 cell site nationwide and is building 100 cell sites monthly to increase its capacity.
Evans stated: “we make sure that we would not have congestions like other networks. So, we keep making efforts to build capacity. We have set aside $2billion dollars for this. We are reasonably sure we would be able to handle it.” The CEO said the Etisalat Easylife package, provides various incentives to its customers is the telecoms market’s first adding that, “this is the first time this is being done in Nigeria.
It is in line with our commitment at inception to get 9ja talking because we know that everything in life, business or social, political or religious, requires communication. And we know that when people talk, understanding increases, friendships develop, ideas are generated, dreams are born and life advances.”
As Nigeria celebrates her Golden Jubilee, Evans said that Etisalat is celebrating its second year of operations within an impressive 5 million customers on its network while “every single one of our pan-Nigeria cell sites are data-enabled.” Etisalat network is offering its customers the chance to enjoy a service called “EasyLife” designed to make life easy for all its subscribers on both Easy Starter and Easy Cliq packages, under its Nigeria @ 50 Anniversary promotions.
The Etisalat CEO added that customers can now make calls to any network, anytime and anywhere in the country for as low as 25k per seconds (N15 per minutes) while allowing existing and new subscribers to stay connected to their loved ones, family, business associates during the Jubilee and beyond. Moving forward, Evans said that customer priorities are considered highly by the mobile phone company, a move that initiated the drive for value-added services to empower its customers by introducing a cost-cutting intervention to the market.
Evans promised that Etisalat “will continue to bring up innovative ideas to satisfy our customers.”
Giving details of the tariff offer, Wael Ammar, chief commercial officer, Etisalat Nigeria pointed out subscribers, whether new or existing, need to dial *220*1# to migrate to Easylife while adding that a token of N20 daily access charge is automatically renewed at midnight everyday. This charge he said is to show a level of commitment from subscribers as they have observed that customers sign-up for it and make calls and then go out of it by doing this they can strike a balance.
He noted that subscribers would receive a confirmatory message conveying the success of their subscription and can dial *220# to confirm whether they are on the plan or not while dialing *220# to deactivate. Ammar said that where a subscriber is on more than one tariff plan, the cheaper of both is applied to call cost while adding that calls made at midnight which currently cost 10k per second on Easy Starter and free on Easy Cliq would remain as they are provided when standard conditions are met.
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