NCC puts active telecoms subscribers in October at 141m

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) says that it recorded 140,766,653 active subscribers of the telecommunication networks in October as against 139,905,213 in September.

The telecommunications regulatory agency disclosed this in its Monthly Subscriber/Operator Data that was available on its website on Tuesday.

The active subscribers increased by 861,440.

According to the data, 140,350,383 of the 140,766,653 active numbers subscribe to the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network services.

The GSM operators’ active customers’ figure increased by 863,551 in October, compared to 139,486,832 subscribers recorded in September.

The reports stated that out of the GSM operators, MTN had 50,720,702 users in October, showing an increase of 413,533 from the 50,307,169 it recorded in September.

Globacom’s figure increased in October by 68,954 with 37,418,933 customers, as against 37,349,979 in September.

Airtel had 35,089,690 subscribers in the month under review, which showed an increase of 463,946 users, from the 34,625,744 recorded in September.

9mobile recorded a drop in customers by 82,882 in October, giving a customer base of 17,121,058, as against 17,203,940 users in September.

The Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) operators retained its September figure of 217,566 users in October.

Visafone which is one of the two surviving CDMA operators had 213,106 customers, while Multi-Links had 4,460 in the month under review.

The monthly subscriber/operator data showed that the Fixed Wireless network (landline) consumers remained at 26,865 in October.

One of the two landline networks, Visafone had 26,437 subscribers, while Multi-Links maintained its record of 428 customers.

It also revealed that the Fixed Wired operators (landline) subscriber base decreased by 4,854, coming down to 110,351 users in October, as against 115,205 recorded in September.

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In the Fixed Wired arena, MTN Fixed moved from 8,233 users in September to 8,315 users in October, thereby increasing by 82 users.

Glo Fixed had 8,548 users in October, reducing by 4,485 customers from the September record of 13,033

IpNX network moved from 2,541 subscriber base in September to 2,551 in October, hence, its customers increased by 10.

It said that 21st Century Network had 90,937 customers in October, recording a decrease of 46 users from its September record of 91,398.

The report also showed that the two Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) networks had 61,488 active users in October, as their customers increased by 2,745, from their September subscriber base of 58,745.

Of the VOIP networks, Smile Communication had 57,877 customers, giving an increase of 2,527 users to its September result of 55,350.

Ntel had 3,611 consumers subscribing to its products and services in October, showing an increase of 216 users to the September record of 3,395.

The regulatory body said that Section 89, Subsection 3(c) of the Nigerian Communications Act, 2003 mandated it to monitor and report the state of the telecommunications industry.

“The commission is mandated to provide statistical analyses and identify industry trends with regard to: services, tariffs, operators, technology, subscribers, issues of competition and dominance.

“This is with a view to identifying areas where regulatory intervention will be needed.

“The commission regularly conducts studies, surveys and produces reports on the telecommunications industry.

“Therefore, telecommunications operators are obligated, under the terms of their licenses, to provide NCC with such data on a regular basis for analytical review and publishing,” the report said.