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Worthy of note is that after MTN Nigeria spent over $120 million in its 5G network stream, the West and Central African (WCA) region stands as the fastest download and upload speed as per the Ookla Speedtest Intelligence data.
The download speed of the telco has further increased to 95.62 Mbps in the second quarter of 2024. It also tested the upload speed which stood at 17.01 Mbps, its best run so far.
This is a big boost for MTN Nigeria, whose five million plus customers on 5G need a fast connection. It will also increase the overall attractiveness of the telco to potential subscribers as well. MTN Nigeria controls about half the telecom market share in the country.
MTN Nigeria is also ahead of other subsidiaries in the MTN group such as MTN Ghana, MTN Benin, MTN Côte d’Ivoire, and MTN Cameroon both in download and upload speeds. The telco also has a better position than competing companies like Airtel with a median download speed of 30.35 Mbps and a speed of upload of 10.28 Mbps which is the fastest for a 4G network till the year 2022.
The telco SIM was launched in September 2022 and the firm announced it was rolling out a 5G network. The company started with a network in seven major cities including Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Ibadan, Kano, Owerri and Maiduguri but in a year the network spread out. By 2023, the 5G network was launched in ‘MTN Nigeria’ 11% of the population resulting in an infrastructure investment of over $120 million. According to the firm, it has commissioned more than 2,100 5G sites across the country since it began offering the service.
“The effects of 5G up to this time have been confined to Nigeria given the fact that the implementation of 5G remains a novel activity in most of the region. “Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire: MTN is eager to extend 5G to the rest of its markets, and it upgrades 4G network infrastructure apps at the same time,” Karim Yaici, the lead industry analyst at Ookla, said.
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As of September 2024, Nigeria had 3.3 million 5G subscribers, representing 2.19% of the country’s 154.9 million active mobile subscribers, according to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). MTN dominates the 5G market with 2.6 million subscribers, accounting for approximately 79% of 5G users in the country.
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