Paratus Zambia, a part of the pan-African telecommunications company Paratus Group, has been awarded a data gateway licence in Zambia; this is, apparently, the country's last available such licence.
The award, from regulator the Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA), is important because, according to a number of news reports, only data licence holders can deploy international gateways and cross-border communications services, and import internet data traffic into the country.
In fact this service had previously been limited to mobile network and carrier providers. Now Paratus Zambia has joined the five other data gateway licensees in Zambia in holding exclusive rights to import and export internet data capacity.
Quoted on the MyBroadband ICT website, Marius van Vuuren, the Managing Director of Paratus Zambia, said: “With this license, we can leverage our terrestrial and cross-border fibre network and satellite communications to provide high-quality internet services and import/export internet data capacity to other ISPs in Zambia.”
Chama Chinyanta, the General Manager of Infrastructure at Paratus Zambia, added, “We started the process in April 2022. We were awarded the ZICTA tender because Paratus meets the necessary infrastructure requirements. For example, our network is connected and spans the southern African region. This means we can deliver what is needed: international data connections to neighbouring countries. We are now one of six providers with this type of license and can import/export data into and out of Zambia.”
The award comes at a time when Paratus Zambia is nearing completion of its metro fibre rollout project which was carried out in partnership with Meta.