Chad’s telecoms regulator, Autorité de Régulation des Communications Électroniques et de la Poste (Arcep), has renewed the licence of telco Airtel Chad with some new specifications and stronger QoS requirements.
In a signing ceremony streamed on Facebook earlier this week, Minister of Post and the Digital Economy Boukar Michel said the new specifications for the licence include deploying optical fibre in "urban and peri-urban areas".
According to a report from Ecofin Agency, that will enable Airtel Chad to chase new revenue streams as it deploys fibre to strengthen its home and enterprise broadband data offerings.
The revised licence also comes with conditions Airtel Chad must fulfill, with a particular emphasis on improving quality of service.
Airtel Chad knows full well the consequences of falling short of QoS conditions. In August 2023, we reported that Arcep fined the telco XAF5 billion (US$8.3 million) for failing to meet QoS requirements.
The regulator said it saw a “noticeable deterioration in quality” in Airtel services following an audit required under an MoU signed by Arcep, Airtel and rival telco Moov Africa Chad in 2021 to address a barrage of complaints from subscribers over service quality.
Under that MoU, Airtel and Moov agreed to invest XAF29 billion and XAF27 billion respectively in network development over three years. As part of the agreement, a committee was set up to monitor investment impact on quality of service.
According to Datareportal, there were just over 13 million cellular mobile connections in Chad at the start of this year, which represents 70.4% market penetration and 9.6% growth from the start of 2023. However, internet usage is considerably lower in the country, with just 4.18 million internet users in January 2024, or 22.5% of the population.