Remains of CDMAs Litter Telecom Graveyard

Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the telecoms industry regulator has declared 13 telecoms operators inactive, suggesting a crowded graveyard especially for the once active code division multiple access (CDMA) subsector of the telecoms industry.

The list of inactive operators, which was posted on NCC’s website, include one national carrier, one GSM operator, five CDMA  operators and six fixed/fixed wireless operators.

The operators include NITEL, MTel, Starcomms, Reliance Telecoms (Zoom Mobile), Intercellular, MTS First Communications, WiTel, O’ Net (Odua Telecoms), Rainbownet, Monarch Communications, Xs Broadband, Webcom, and Disc Communications.

The operators became inactive, following the total loss of their customers to other operators that are currently pulling weight in the industry.

They had since gone into extinction and could no longer offer competitive services to their customers, who decided to port to other network operators.

NCC decided to declare the operators inactive to enable it study and circulate the accurate figures of telecoms operations in the country.

Majority of the inactive companies are CMDAs whose fortune took a plunge for a number of reasons including the local financiers’ refusal to lend to the operators because of their repulsive financial record.

Further investigations revealed that some CDMA operators had over the years regularly and consciously ignored sustained and systematic red flags as their promoters and managers diverted funds meant for expansion into frivolous projects like manufacturing, oil and gas, elections and so on.

The deaths of CDMAs were also quickened by corporate mismanagement because of the fraudulent and self-serving practices of some members of board and management and the overbearing influence of chairmen or MD/CEOs of CDMAs.

Experts also point at non-compliance with laid down internal controls and operation procedures, biased recruitment exercises and general lack luster management practices as some of the reasons why the companies have failed to click.

The sorry state of affairs with the CDMA operators has also to do with growing subscribers’ preference for GSM services.

But in comparing both the technologies GSM has some limitation when the call quality is concerned but still has more flexibility and an easy implementation relative to the CDMA technology.

The major difference between the two lies in terms of the technology they use, security factors, their global reach and the data transfer speeds.

CDMA has faster data rate as compared to GSM as EVDO data transfer technology is used in CDMA which offers a maximum download speed of 2 mbps. 

EVDO ready mobile phones are required to use this technology. GSM uses EDGE data transfer technology that has a maximum download speed of 384 kbps which is slower as compared to CDMA.

.