Ethio Telecom, the fully state owned telecom monopoly in Ethiopia, has ‘harvested’ 22 billion birr (about $670 million at the current exchange rate) gross profit during the first six months from July 1 to December 31, 2019. It is recalled that the government of Ethiopia has recently announced liberalizing the telecom sector and sell less than 50 percent share of Ethiopia Telecom to foreign telecom operators. During the performance period, Ethio Telecom subscribes reached 45.6 million which is 99 % of the company’s target and an increase of 10.9% from the previous year of similar period. Mobile voice subscribers reached 44.03 million, Data and Internet users 22.74 million and Fixed Services 1.01 Million, which resulted in 45.4% teledensity, according to the statement. Among the challenges Ethio telecom faced during the period, Fiber and copper cable vandalism, commercial power interruption, telecom fraud & OTT, security problems and delay in land acquisition for new site deployment were the main ones.

Source: News Business Ethiopia January 16, 2020 04:07 UTC