NCC licences two new Infraco for South-east, North-east

The Board of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has approved two additional Infrastructure Company (Infraco) licences in order to deepen broadband penetration in the country.

The two new Infraco licencees are Zinox Technology Limited for South-east and Brinks Integrated Solutions Limited for North-east, according to a statement yesterday by NCC’s Director of Public Affairs, Mr Tony Ojobo.

With this approval, the number of Infracos licenced so far is now four.

More than one year ago, MainOne Cable Company Limited got its licence to provide services in Lagos while IHS was licensed to cover the North-central geopolitical zone including Abuja.

The Infraco licences are based on the NCC’s Open Access Model (OAM) in line with the National Broadband Plan (NBP) of (2013 - 2018).

By provisions of the NBP, Nigeria is expected to attain 30 percent broadband penetration by December 2018, but many experts and players within the sector are saying this is not feasible.

But NCC believes this is possible. As part of the initiative to achieve this, NCC, as the driver of this process, has so far licenced a number of companies to stimulate broadband penetration.

These include Bitflux Communications Limited (Bitflux) for 2.3 Ghz and MTN Nigeria for the 2.6 Ghz licences. Other licences are in the pipeline in this process.

As at December, 2017, Nigeria had attained 22% broadband penetration, according to the NCC’s Executive Vice Chairman Prof Umar Garba Danbatta.

With the licensing of four Infracos: MainOne Cable, IHS, Zinox Technology and Brinks Solutions, there are three more licencees waiting approval to bring the total number to seven.

These are for South-south, North-west and South-west.