Mr. Amechi Stanley is the Managing Director and Chief Executive of Leystel Nigeria limited, a Nigerian based IT Consulting firm and wireless communication service that specialized in tailoring quality wireless communication solutions and added value services. In this interview with HiTech, he bared his mind on telecom operation in Nigeria, the explosion, challenges and the potentials in the economy, and forecasts that satellite telecommunications will soon die out in Nigeria. Excerpts: How would you appraise the Nigeria telecom market? The Nigerian telecom market is a fast growing market with high teledensity rate of over 92m active subscribers but Nigerian market is lacking the basic infrastructure and requisite skills to deliver one stop solution to the teeming subscribers. Again, the market is not growing as it should, compared the way other countries that manufacture technology do because it consume a lot of technology without manufacturing. Our cost of deploying fibre is high. We don’t have what it takes to move at the desired speed compared to what obtains in other places. Apart from voice calls and data, what other benefits can we derive from use of this technology? We can use technology to fight crime by the use of toll free lines. We can design a product people can use to offer information on security. It can also be used to plan a hitch free election and fight fake drugs. It can equally be used to track stolen cars. With this, it will be easier for security agencies to tracks cars that are not registered in Nigeria and this will make their work easier. With our telecom solution, we can write a programme and query it. Although, we are distributors of transmission equipments and consultants in telecom sector. We can sit down with our clients and visualize where their client needs lie. Our partnership with the core telecom operators has resulted into increase in their revenue base. One of the areas of the partnership is in deploying a technology can enable them see traffic build up. The technology works in such a way that when the network is saturated, a red alert shows, telling the clients where to upgrade and will not wait for everything to freeze before taking a proactive measure. This is work we see in the banking sector very often, leading to a huge economic loss to the country. Why is Nigeria in this kind of situation? It is chain reaction. There is no company in Nigeria that can provide a one stop solution that can deliver a total package level of network. All the service providers have to be on top of their game to provide this service. That is what I learnt from my eleven years experience in Denmark, Canada and other European countries, where I worked on transmission of fibre to all the sectors. Are Nigerians actually making quality use of their GSM phones? I don’t think so. We have to make quality use of GSM tools like transfer of data in e-payment because it is not a luxury. Added value can also added to the use of GSM phones when Nigerians use it more for data transfer and internet services and SMS. GSM has gone beyond voi The Hidden Secret ce services. Who are your partners? Our major mostly on telecom service providers, oil and gas and manufacturing companies. We have partners like Lavia that majored in microwave equipment, Wavion for networking, through which we try to deploy WiFi technology. We equally have Alvarion, that is manufacturing a transmission solution. We did not stop there, we synergize with Ragwi company in UK that major on microwave communication that deliver one stop solution to customers, a major distributor in the whole of Europe. We have CISCO for networking and hardware solution. We partner with them to deliver profitable solutions to our clients. We are here to deliver one stop solution that will give Nigerian operators value for their money.We also offer support to upcoming telecommunication companies and conglomerates in the manufacturing sector. We don’t just drop the box, we also deliver the solution on behalf of our foreign partners. Competitors? Our major competitors are people coming from China and India, but we are not afraid of them because that is why we focus on on offering advanced solutions that cannot be matched by any other company. However, we try to adopt the approach of measuring twice and cutting ones. What other services do you offer? We certify companies that may want to offer services withing our area of operation. We needed to certify them for them to be acquainted with the latest technologies. Our strength lies in our solution. Wherever, we deploys, the quality of output speaks volume about the uniqueness of our service. We equally provide WiFi communication services to pipelines, carrying WiFi and fibre over pipelines. With our WiFi services, any 3G phone within the area of coverage will be hooked up in the network service. We are working with oil and gas companies to provide WiFi services on the pipelines, carrying internet over fibre. We equally offer Ragway services, which has about 23 member countries that make up the RAG Group that offers radio, internet, voice and other communication services. On the launch of Sat-3 Satellite In Europe and US, satellite is mostly used for monitoring weather forecast, for GPRS tracking. Satellite communication is gradually dying all over the world. It is best used for monitoring services. Presently, it will be difficult for satellite to survive in this market. All the telecommunication companies have started laying fibre and as fibre is getting to the last mile, they are decommissioning satellite. The one that can’t get to the last mile point, they use last mile radio. Again, fibre delivers service in seconds while satellite delivers in minutes. Though, fibre may be expensive at the beginning, but at the long run, it will return value for the money. As at today, about sixty percent of Satellite services have been decommissioned in Nigeria. We have Main One, Glo 1, MTN Direct and others coming, providing choice to Nigerians. This is driving us towards having a robust communication line. The issue of traffic will be dealt with using fibre. That is where the whole world is going because that is where we can deliver quality internet services. That is why a branch of a bank in Nigeria can talk to another branch in London an South Africa and exchange data via cable. We have to look at how we are going to bridge the existing gap in communication system in every sector of the economy, using GSM and by the time we finish we will have so many options. The Hidden Secret zp8497586rq
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