Glo-1 to induce internet revolution – Olajide

The landing of the much-awaited Glo-1 submarine cable in the country is expected to crash cost of bandwidth and induce a new wave of internet revolution.

Head, Network Operations at the Globacom Limited, Mr. Aremu Olajide, gave this insight in a parley with newsmen, last weekend in Lagos.

He said that beginning from September through October, when Glo-1 must have gone commercial, and its fibre optic cable fully completed that it would encourage diffusion of internet in the country.

Olajide also predicted that the landing of the Glo-1 in Lagos shore in August will spur a crash in cost of bandwidth from its present price of about $72,000 to about $7000.

According to him, provision of infrastructure like the submarine cable, Glo-1, and other fibre links nationwide is mainly because the operator is determined to reposition Nigeria in terms of telecommunications development and services.

“As Nigerians, Glo is doing it and we believe we can do it,” he declared.
Equally he foresee that collaboration between Fixed wireline operators in the country, could boost internet at homes, noting however, that fixed wireline is a very difficult aspect of investment in telecom sector.

“Fixed line when activated will pave way for internet revolution,” he asserted.

Olajide explained that 15 to 16 million subscribers are currently making calls on the network, while its present active subscriber-base is in the neighbourhood of 20 million whereas the network has capacity for 35 million subscribers.

“… They are those making calls daily and we have capacity for 35 million,” he said.
Maintaining that Glo is resolute on crashing tariff further, having initiated the same step a few years back through its international call rates and even gateway services abroad.

Speaking on its recent cable cut in Lekki by the Lekki Construction Company, he said that although some of Glo cables were affected, but a self-healing fibre optic.

This is coming as Glo has restated its interest in the first national operator and moribund Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), whenever the bid opens.

Despite the fact that Globacom was initially licensed as SNO to checkmate the inability of NITEL and thus spur activities in the organization, which has so far failed culminating in various attempts to dispose NITEL at all cost.

Reaffirming its disposition to bid for NITEL in spite of the plans by the Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE) to unbundle the organization into about five subsidiaries, Globacom said that if given the opportunity to buy NITEL, it is ready to turn it around.

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