MTN CEO talks 5G licence with President Nana Akufo-Addo in USA

Group President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of telecommunications giant MTN Group, Mr Ralph Mupita, has told President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo that the company has a  keen  interest in participating in any future spectrum auction for 5G infrastructure in Ghana.

According to him, 5G infrastructure will facilitate faster and more efficient internet services in Ghana.

MTN delegation meets President Akufo-Addo in New York

He made the appeal when he led a three member high level delegation from MTN to pay a courtesy call on   President Nana Akufo-Addo at his hotel in New York in the United States of America.

UN General Assembly

President Akufo-Addo, is attending the 77th United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York.

Other members of the delegation

The delegation included Nompilo Morafo, Group Chief Sustainability and Corporate Affairs Officer of MTN Group and Ebenezer Asante, Senior Vice-President of MTN in charge of Markets.

They called on the President on Tuesday, September 20, 2022.

MTN delays 5G pilots

MTN Ghana had to put back a pilot of its 5G services this year due to the lack of licence from the regulator.

The company did not give a time frame of when the pilot will eventually begin.

Initially, the operator predicted the launch of 5G services in March this year but discussions are still ongoing with regulators.

MTN readies 1,322 sites for 5G

The telecom giant has modernized at least 1,322 sites in readiness for the launch of commercial 5G services.

525 gigabits per second packet core capacity

The company has also upgraded its packet core capacity to 525 gigabits per second, which is designed to power its converged voice and data services on 4G LTE and also effectively deploy and operate one packet network for 2G, 3G and a wide range of other technologies.

5G Packet Core also known as 5G Core (5GC) is the heart of a 5G mobile network, and it handles a wide variety of essential functions in the mobile network, such as connectivity and mobility management, authentication and authorization, subscriber data management and policy management, among others things.

Ghana has a 90% 4G coverage rate

Already, MTN had over that past 25 years mounted 4,100 sites and over 400 rural telephony sites, providing 98% 2G/3G coverage and 73% 4G coverage across the country.

MTN has also built an additional 120 new 2G/3G sites and 607 new 4G sites this year alone.

MTN was established in South Africa at the dawn of democracy in 1994 as a leader in transformation.

Since then, the company has grown by investing in sophisticated communication infrastructure, developing new technologies and by harnessing the talents of its diverse people.

The MTN Group is currently a multinational telecommunications group, with its core operations in 21 countries in Africa and the Middle East.

As at the end of December 2008 MTN recorded more than 90,700,000 subscribers worldwide.