By Ibrahim Olukotun
Lagos. November 19, 2012: Two telecom giants, MTN Nigeria and Globacom have embarked on comprehensive network modernisation and infrastructure replacement projects nationwide to make their services more efficient for phone subscribers.
Simultaneously, the two telecoms operators have appealed to their customers to bear with them if the processes they have put in place to minimise inconveniences and network disruptions still left slight service difficulties.
The modernization projects will cover upgrading their power systems to Hybrid generators which will significantly reduce diesel consumption and make the installations more environment-friendly.
The national network upgrade and expansion projects will also require change of Base Transceiver Stations and roll-out of new ones, the companies announced in separate market updates.
The ongoing projects will be implemented by the combined team of the telecoms operators’ engineers and their various technical partners, Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, Huawei and ZTE.
They will replace key network components in all aspects of their architecture such as transmission, radio and core network system.
To minimise inconvenience to customers, MTN and Glo have put certain measures in place, such as working on the critical parts of the project at night when usage of the network is usually at the lowest ebb, adopting a cluster arrangement for swapping out the Base Transceiver Stations (BTS), they said.
Glo Nigeria says the scope of its project include optimisation of existing Base Transceiver Stations (BTS), accelerating the pace of rollout of new base stations to deepen reception nationwide, integration of the firm’s infrastructure with Glo 1 international submarine cable and upgrade of the radio access network.
According to Glo, these will ensure that data customers enjoy unparalleled speed and reliability as it is replacing all old power generators with new, energy efficient Hybrid power system to ensure a cleaner, healthier environment while its improved stability guarantees uninterrupted services.
The companies apologized for inconveniences caused by the infrastructure upgrade underway and assured subscribers of improved quality services.
As MTN puts it: “We envisage that there may be slight inconvenience to our customers in certain areas, especially at night during the implementation of the project. For some other locations, especially where security situation may not allow our engineers to work at night, there may be temporary service difficulties in the course of our swapping equipment and optimising the network.”
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