GSM Operators Soon to Lose Voice Revenue

There are strong indications that global system for mobile communications (GSM) operators in the country will soon lose voice service as its mainstream revenue source, Nigeria CommunicationsWeek has learnt.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek gathered that this is coming against the backdrop of recent developments in the telecommunications landscape that saw the launch of Voice over Long-Term Evolution (VoLTE) by ntel and Smile Communications.

VoLTE is based on the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) network, with specific profiles for control and media planes of voice service on LTE. This approach results in the voice service control and media planes being delivered as data flows within the LTE data bearer.

This means that there is no dependency on or ultimately, requirement for the legacy circuit-switched voice network to be maintained. VoLTE has up to three times more voice and data capacity than 3G UMTS and up to six times more than 2G GSM.

David Venn, chief executive officer, Spectranet, a 4G LTE internet service provider, explained that 4G LTE is designed for data while 3G is designed for voice with data capacity as well, he added that the telecommunications landscape in the country will soon change from a voice centric to data centric source of revenue just as WhatsApp has almost eroded revenue that GSM operators are making from short message service (SMS).

He hinged this development on the launch of voice over LTE (VoLTE) by ntel the new owners of Nitel and Smile Communications as well as MTN acquisition of Visafone with 800MGHZ spectrum which allows for superior data network.

“More so, NCC will auction 2.6ghz spectrum in May this year and the 700MGHZ spectrum will be freed when the country migrates from analogue broadcast to digital broadcasting next year. All these will give rise to launch of voLTE network by operators that allows operators focus on data with voice as value added.

“In most European countries operators don’t make money from voice service any longer, their revenue is based on data service which allows the subscriber to make voice calls and use data alongside. You purchase certain gigabyte of data and use it for browsing as well as make calls on it,” he said.

Nodding in agreement, Engr. Lanre Ajayi, president, Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) said that VoLTE is an emerging technology that is going to replace GSM and that its deployment in the country is good for the industry.

“We are moving away from voice centric to data centric. This means less revenue from voice as voice service is going to be value added, though it does not mean loss of revenue to the operators but rather change in the source of the revenue from voice as is the case today to data which also offer voice service,” he said.

He however, expressed reservation over quality of service even with VoLTE technology which has a better quality of service than GSM technology.

“The real challenge of quality of service in our environment is congest of the network by operators; it is not problem of technology. Operators put too many subscribers on the network more than the capacity of the network which leads to poor quality of service. LTE is a good technology that affords clearer and better service quality but, if the problem of congestion continues, it may make nonsense of the technology in terms of quality of service,” he noted.