Appropriately termed “Digitalisation”, Vodafone Ghana is already making available market tools and solutions on its network to support families and businesses at one go.

“Digitalisation allows us to play beyond just our network. It allows us to include people digitally into the ecosystem. We are looking at the possibilities of delivering these through either mobile solutions or our products,” the Chief Executive of Vodafone Ghana, Ms Yolanda Zoleka Cuba, told the Daily Graphic in an interview.

She said Vodafone was “committed to seeing to it that Ghana gets digitised. We want to touch the lives of every youth across the country – whether they are on our network or not.”

In that regard, the company, using an “Internet-of-Things” platform has already deployed vehicle management solutions which enable fleet owners to track the movement of their vehicles and goods from the comfort of their offices or homes.

Saturated telecoms industry

Ghana, with a population of about 28 million, has six Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), with several broadband wireless access network providers – a situation that has led to a fragmentation of the market.

MNOs have for long complained about this development, which in comparison with what pertains in a lot of other markets, leaves much to be desired.

Ms Cuba said the fragmentation affected the investment levels of telcos, especially with the industry not showing as much growth as it should.

The biggest prospect in Ghana’s telecom market now is data growth which each telco in the market is jostling for. The downside, again, relates to market saturation where Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) networks have also been licensed to offer data services alongside the MNOs.

“It’s growing in spite of what we do as an industry. In all the markets that data is growing, it’s good. But again, here in Ghana, there are BWAs playing in that space as well, and this is one of the challenges,” she stressed.

4G

Playing in the 4G space was actually a difficult one for Vodafone; and not that it did not want to utilise the technology.The real issue was that the telecommunications company was torn between the option of continuously investing to improve its network for voice, data clarity and reach against buying a spectrum that was highly overpriced, in the company’s opinion.

“No doubt, 4G is an efficient technology and from a customer perspective it can give increased speed. From our perspective, it’s just not cost efficient for us to deploy the technology,” Ms Cuba stated.

Spectrum regulation

The Vodafone CEO, therefore, called for the removal of the artificial barrier imposed by regulation to allow for the unification of different technologies within the same spectrum.

The current regulation means that only 3G could be used on 3G spectrum, 2G on 2G and so on. In other countries, however, there was flexibility in how a company combines a number of spectra for its operations.

“A lot of other markets actually allow for unified licensing and re-farming of spectrum so that they can get 4G. For example, in South Africa, they actually haven’t issued any 4G spectrum licences. The last time they issued an allocation was in 2002. Spectrum used for 3G is actually used for 4G as well,” Ms Cuba, who prior to heading the Ghana business, worked in the company’s operations in South Africa, said. She is, however, optimistic about the future progression of the company.

“Through carrier aggregations, you are able to increase speed and Vodafone will look at that option. The current regulation that has limited the flexibility of a unified license will not help customers to enjoy the best service,” she said.