Mozambique Telecom (Tmcel) recorded an average mobile data download speed of 27.8 Mbps in the fourth quarter of the year (2023), leading among the country’s operators and one of the fastest in Africa, according to a report consulted this Monday, 22 January, by Lusa.
According to the latest report by specialist company Ookla, which analyses the Internet around the world on a quarterly basis, the performance of the Mozambican state-owned operator is above the 21.46 Megabytes per second (Mbps) of the fastest operator in Senegal and close to the 30.13 Mbps of the operator in Ivory Coast, but also above operators in some countries in South America and Asia.
The Ookla report, which analyses the network globally in 52 countries, also states that in the fourth quarter of 2023, Tmcel also had “the highest mobile consistency” of the network of 91.6% – at least a minimum download speed of 5 Mbps and a minimum upload speed of 1 Mbps – of the time, among the country’s three mobile operators.
“Of Mozambique’s most populous cities, Maputo had the fastest average mobile and fixed download speeds, with 26.33 Mbps and 14.65 Mbps respectively,” reads the report.
In September, the chairman of Tmcel’s Management Committee, Mahomed Adamo Mussá, said in Maputo that the Mozambican state-owned telecommunications company is undergoing a “new rebirth”, as part of the revitalisation of operations until May 2024, budgeted at 132 million dollars (123 million euros). “The first two months were spent drawing up an 18-month plan to reverse the company’s situation. That’s what we’re going to do: a new rebirth,” he said.
In May, the mobile and fixed telecoms operator’s shareholders approved a Management Committee, plans to revitalise the company and reduce costs, along with a cost centre profitability study.
The management showed growth in various indicators with the inclusion of new products and explained that the project to expand and modernise Tmcel’s telecommunications network, budgeted at 132 million dollars (123 million euros) and financed by China’s Eximbank, with completion scheduled for May 2024, has already been 57% executed, which involved, among other investments, the installation of 778 more antennas to transmit the telecommunications signal, out of a planned 1,350.
Also as part of the modernisation and expansion of the network, which began in January 2022 after “almost ten years without investment”, Tmcel, which operates a support network of 7600 kilometres of optical fibre and 8500 kilometres of access networks, has already increased broadband coverage from ten to 400 gigabits per second (Gbps).
“We have now covered all the country’s provinces, thus fulfilling our commitment made last September to modernise the Lichinga network and introduce 4.5G in this capital city,” explained Tmcel’s Marketing Director, Adil Ginabay. The new network went live in the capital of Niassa province on 8 December.
Currently, Tmcel’s market share in Mozambique is between 10 and 12 per cent in terms of active customers, but the goal set by the management committee is to exceed 25 per cent in the medium term.
