Thousand thronged e-NNOVATE 2005

Africa’s first ever expo on technological innovation and value added services e-NNOVATE 2005 ended up proving industry watchers right that Nigeria’s fledgling telecom sector had gone beyond mere provision of voice. Subscribers want to do more than talk. They want phone service that would add more values to their time; connect them to the Internet; provide a log-in process to their workplace VPN while they are on the move; make banking transactions; place orders for anything from a lunch box to a laptop; and even help express generosity as Mtel’s new product, ‘share the talk’ would permit.

More than anything else, the two day event pooled thousands of visitors that kept the booths of participating companies busy all the time. They range from GSM network owners, fixed wireless providers, Internet service providers, content providers to other technology companies.

Mtel’s ‘share the talk’ enables Mtel subscribers to dispense credit directly from their phones onto the phones of other Mtel subscribers and underscore a creative innovation to keep African famed generosity alive inside the mobile phones. “Share the talk’ derives from Mtel’s determination as a company to meet the communications needs of Nigerians regardless of their wealth or status in society,” said Prince Apampa, Mtel’s chief marketing officer adding “The new will be invaluable especially for friends and family to share the Mtel experience of clear seamless communication.”

The new drivers of Nigeria’s IP services for data, voice and video streams were there too and they include Accelon which is set to unroll international voice services on IP. Others driving data on CDMA 2000 1x were also conspicuous including Reltel and Starcomms.

But what e-NNOVATE explored more was the latent potential that could explode months ahead in a country where ICT investment in the last four years has exceeded $4 billion (about N520 billion). Nigeria’s Communications Minister Chief Cornelius Adebayo who declared the event open attributed the turbo-speed growth in the sector to “policy stability and consistency of the Obasanjo administration, coupled with a focused and transparent regulatory regime.” Both factors have combined to inspire the confidence of investors in the telecommunications industry in Nigeria, the Nigerian minister said.
The e-NNOVATE expo project which was jointly organized by leading communications management consultancy, XLR8 Limited and the Nigerian Communications Commission was commended by the minister as a “reflection of the latent potential of Nigeria’s information and communications technology industry.” XLR8 is led by Calixthus Okoruwa.

More…..

Back To Top