(AFP Photo)
By Mohamed Alaa El Din
Vodafone Egypt’s technology sector invested over EGP 4.5bn, of the total investments estimated by EGP 9.5bn, over the last 15 months in developing and improving the company’s services in Egypt, Technology Director Osama Said, said.
Said added that the technology sector invested more than EGP 420m for the network development sector, to ensure that the network is completely developed. Moreover, networks will be provided with alternative energy solutions to face the electricity outage crisis. Stations were provided with more than 600 electric generators, 50,000 batteries, and 150 solar energy stations, which the company aims to increase to 180 by the end of this year.
Said declared that 85% of the company’s network depends on commercial electric current, while the other 15% depends on alternative energy. He pointed out that Egypt changes the network’s batteries every two years, while this is done in the UK every seven years, due to the regular outages in Egypt, which sometimes last for several hours.
In order to face electricity outages, the company installed batteries in the Delta governorates that function for six hours, and four hours in the rest of the governorates.
According to Said, the challenges facing the company as a mobile operator include the electricity outages and the infrastructure offered by Telecom Egypt (TE). For service operators, it has became difficult to fix any problem in devices located in TE’s communication centres, even if the companies have the necessary security licenses. This has negatively affected the market’s service level in general, he said.
80% of Vodafone’s network is ready to provide the fourth generation Internet services (4G) once applicable frequencies and licenses for new service are granted.
