Rwanda’s telecommunication regulator Utilities Regulatory Agency (RURA) has finally invited bids for a third unified licence to provide fixed and mobile phone services. RURA’s acting director-general Diogene Mudenge said it expected telephony penetration to rise to 50 percent in two years from the 9 percent currently. The government also targets to have at least 5 million GSM subscribers by 2012. The licence will allow the operator to provide fixed and mobile services and is valid for 15 years, according to Reuters. Four companies which have expressed interest include Orascom, an unidentified Israeli company, Korea Telecom (KT) and the Kuwait based Zain International which operates the Celtel brand in sub-Saharan Africa. A new licensee would provide competition to the country’s two existing telecommunications firms, Rwandatel and MTN Rwanda. Currently Rwanda has only one GSM operator, MTN Rwanda. The other operator Rwandatel is yet to upgrade to GSM and uses a type of CDMA technology which doesn’t support roaming services.
Source: Telecom Paper
