This partnership which was flagged off at a public sector event organized by Signal Alliance in conjunction with SAP in Abuja penultimate week, to introduce the enterprise asset management (EAM) software to the Nigerian market. EAM is a solution from SAP that ensures operational efficiencies, improves asset usage, reduces costs, and better manages capital expenditures throughout the asset lifecycle. It will help address the infrastructural gap in public sector by providing a solution for managing public physical assets ranging from dams, power grids, airports, to vehicles, and building facilities.
The event, held at the Yar Adua Center in Abuja was tagged “Providing an Enterprise Asset Management Approach to optimizing public assets” saw delegates from various Ministries, Departments and Agencies in attendance.
Collins Onuegbu, the managing director of Signal Alliance, described the concept of asset management as the ideal solution to help businesses & government institutions manage and maximize assets. According to Mr. Onuegbu, “a look at the current findings of the Senate Committee on Public Accounts recently showed how national resources was mismanaged through multiple allocations to various government agencies and projects by past governments which makes the introduction of a robust EAM system like the one being introduced by SAP and Signal Alliance as both timely and of utmost importance”.
In his justification for partnering with Signal Alliance, the Head, Line of Business for SAP West Africa, Mr. Oluseyi Akinyoyenu, reiterated the conviction expressed by SAP that for all of its systems and solutions, Signal Alliance has been identified as a reliable and competent partner in Nigeria that will always help to deliver solutions to customers in all sectors. Describing Enterprise asset management is a key driver for the Nigerian economy, he explained that this unique solution from SAP covers in details all assets owned by private and public enterprise irrespective of size.
Mr. Oluseyi Akinyoyenu also listed some of the benefits of SAP’s EAM solution to include: Faster, more accurate asset reporting and analytics – for savvier decision making, heightened visibility into asset performance, risk and capital expenditures, improved asset utilization with centralized monitoring and control, and Superior asset performance, efficiency, and reliability with minimized disruptions.
In a bid to differentiate between enterprise asset management solution from the more popular enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, a mutual partner of both SAP and Signal Alliance, Mahindra Satyam, represented by its Regional Head –Alliance & Presales SAP Practice MEA, Ramesh Ram, stated that “while ERP helps enterprises to plan towards the deployment of resources, EAM helps them to manage the assets acquired through the implementation of budgets”. He went ahead to explain that capital expenditure management, time to public usage, rising operating expenses, Assets utilization, and Health safety and environmental performance are some of the current challenges EAM is designed to solve.
Also speaking at the event, the chief corporate adviser to Signal Alliance, Mr. Erabor Okogun mentioned that the 17 year old company which is the Titans of Tech 2013 Systems Integrator of the year award winner as well as a TOP 50 leading company in Nigeria, is focused on helping the Federal Government achieve its Transformation agenda hence the partnership with SAP to ensure appropriate technology is available to drive the transformation agenda and ensure the dividends of democracy to the citizenry. Top government officials at the highly interactive session which followed the presentation leaned positively towards the adoption of SAP’s Enterprise Asset Management framework for all public properties and national assets.
About SAP:
As market leader in enterprise application software, SAP (NYSE: SAP) helps companies of all sizes and industries run better. From back office to boardroom, warehouse to storefront, desktop to mobile device – SAP empowers people and organizations to work together more efficiently and use business insight more effectively to stay ahead of the competition. SAP applications and services enable more than 238,000 customers to operate profitably, adapt continuously, and grow sustainably. For more information, visit www.sap.com.
About Signal Alliance
Signal Alliance is a full IT service company with strategic affiliation with Microsoft, SAP, Cisco, CA Technologies, SAP, etc. Our services cover systems integration, IT infrastructure development, Software advisory services, enterprise software, asset Management systems and application development. Our operations cover the West African region from two offices in Lagos and Abuja. Signal Alliance was recently named as the 27 Fastest growing (non-listed) company in Nigeria in the All World Network Nigeria Fast Growth50. AllWorld Network is a company founded by Michael Porter, the famous Harvard professor on strategy and ranks fast growing companies all over the world.
Discover more at: www.signalalliance.com
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As further attestation to its growing influence as a complete IT Systems Integrator of choice in Nigeria, Signal Alliance has been unveiled as the 2013 System Integrator Company of the Year award winner by Titans of Tech. This was done as recognition for Signal Alliances’ unequaled performance in system integration practice in Nigeria within the period in review, during the annual Titans of Tech Awards Night held at Civic Centre, Victoria Island Lagos on Friday, 12th April, 2013.
Signal Alliance ongoing investments in developing skills and competencies around System Integration practices, from Enterprise Networking to Unified Computing System, Collaboration technologies, Cloud Computing, Mobility Solutions and so on underpinned by cost-effective industrialized services, enabled the company to attain its leadership position in Nigeria – hence Titans of Tech recognizing this great work in this year’s Awards Night.
Collins Onuegbu, Chief Executive Officer at Signal Alliance who received this award commented: “As one of Nigeria’s leading IT firms, we help organizations empower their businesses, control operational costs, drive business agility and unleash high Productivity through provision of the right technology architecture, appropriate professional services and ongoing operations that ultimately sets their business ready for Competitive Advantage, Profitability and Value return to shareholders”.
In this keenly contested award category, the overall impact of Signal Alliance over the last 12months was analyzed by a credible panel of judges that concluded that the company out-performed all other contenders for the award. Speaking further on the significance of the award, Mr. Onuegbu said, “we also wish to use this opportunity to thank our numerous customers who have stood by us and trusted us with their businesses, by re-assuring them of our commitment to be a Systems Integration company of choice.”
The Titans of Tech Annual Awards now in its eight year is a forum designed to celebrate Nigeria’s Hi-Tech most important movers and shakers; the Revolutionaries, Icons, Pathfinders, Organizations and institutions that are behind the technological wind of change sweeping Nigeria towards the global information society.
About Signal Alliance Ltd.
Signal Alliance is a full IT service company with strategic affiliation with Microsoft, SAP, Cisco, CA Technologies etc. Our services cover systems integration, IT infrastructure development, Software advisory services, enterprise software and application development. Our operations cover the West African region from two offices in Lagos and Abuja.
Signal Alliance was Microsoft Country Partner of the year for 2012 and current Enterprise Partner and Collaboration and Content Partner of the year for WECA region.
Signal Alliance was recently named as the 27 Fastest growing (non-listed) company in Nigeria in the All World Network Nigeria Fast Growth50. AllWorld Network is a company founded by Michael Porter, the famous Harvard professor on strategy and ranks fast growing companies all over the world.
Discover more at: http://www.signalalliance.com
]]>As further attestation to its growing influence as a complete IT Systems Integrator of choice in Nigeria, Signal Alliance has been unveiled as the 2013 System Integrator Company of the Year award winner by Titans of Tech. This was done as recognition for Signal Alliances’ unequaled performance in system integration practice in Nigeria within the period in review, during the annual Titans of Tech Awards Night held at Civic Centre, Victoria Island Lagos on Friday, 12th April, 2013.
Signal Alliance ongoing investments in developing skills and competencies around System Integration practices, from Enterprise Networking to Unified Computing System, Collaboration technologies, Cloud Computing, Mobility Solutions and so on underpinned by cost-effective industrialized services, enabled the company to attain its leadership position in Nigeria – hence Titans of Tech recognizing this great work in this year’s Awards Night.
Collins Onuegbu, Chief Executive Officer at Signal Alliance who received this award commented: “As one of Nigeria’s leading IT firms, we help organizations empower their businesses, control operational costs, drive business agility and unleash high Productivity through provision of the right technology architecture, appropriate professional services and ongoing operations that ultimately sets their business ready for Competitive Advantage, Profitability and Value return to shareholders”.
In this keenly contested award category, the overall impact of Signal Alliance over the last 12months was analyzed by a credible panel of judges that concluded that the company out-performed all other contenders for the award. Speaking further on the significance of the award, Mr. Onuegbu said, “we also wish to use this opportunity to thank our numerous customers who have stood by us and trusted us with their businesses, by re-assuring them of our commitment to be a Systems Integration company of choice.”
The Titans of Tech Annual Awards now in its eight year is a forum designed to celebrate Nigeria’s Hi-Tech most important movers and shakers; the Revolutionaries, Icons, Pathfinders, Organizations and institutions that are behind the technological wind of change sweeping Nigeria towards the global information society.
About Signal Alliance Ltd.
Signal Alliance is a full IT service company with strategic affiliation with Microsoft, SAP, Cisco, CA Technologies etc. Our services cover systems integration, IT infrastructure development, Software advisory services, enterprise software and application development. Our operations cover the West African region from two offices in Lagos and Abuja.
Signal Alliance was Microsoft Country Partner of the year for 2012 and current Enterprise Partner and Collaboration and Content Partner of the year for WECA region.
Signal Alliance was recently named as the 27 Fastest growing (non-listed) company in Nigeria in the All World Network Nigeria Fast Growth50. AllWorld Network is a company founded by Michael Porter, the famous Harvard professor on strategy and ranks fast growing companies all over the world.
Discover more at: http://www.signalalliance.com
]]>AllWorld Network in partnership with The Tony Elumelu Foundation has listed Signal Alliance among top 50 fastest growing (non-listed) companies in Nigeria termed “Nigeria50”. The Nigeria50 is a ranking of 50 of the fastest growing private (non-listed) companies in Nigeria. The Awardees broke AllWorld records, with each company growing at an average 100% a year on revenues of $9 million USD, and as a group they have created 6,600 jobs, and if they continue growing, will create thousands more in the next few years.
Companies were invited to compete for a spot on the Nigeria50, and those with the fastest revenue growth between 2009 and 2011 made the inaugural ranking. Thousands of emails were sent to companies around the country inviting them to apply. Each company had to provide audited statements to confirm their revenues and each applicant’s business practices and ethics were strenuously vetted by AllWorld. The fastest growing and most transparent became the Nigeria50.
The inaugural winners were announced worldwide at the Nigeria50 Awards & Summit in Lagos in front of an audience of 350 entrepreneurs and business and government leaders including The Honorable Minister of Trade and Investment, Olusegun Aganga; Tony O. Elumelu C.O.N., Chairman of Heirs Holdings and Michael Porter the world-renowned Harvard Business School Professor and Chairman of AllWorld Network.
Signal Alliance Ltd. realizes that the strength of its business stems from the strength of the local Nigerian talent. Says Collins Onuegbu, CEO of Signal Alliance “This award belongs to our people who have committed themselves to building a company that we are all proud of. We will continue to invest in local talent and continue our philosophy of providing the best education for staff that show capacity to learn. This is important to keep the company growing year to year as the industry we play in constantly evolves.”
Commenting on the success of the winners at the Awards Ceremony, AllWorld co-founders Deirdre Coyle and Anne Habiby urged country leaders to champion the initiative. “With the right support, the Nigeria50 will send a signal far and wide that the country is open for business and will energize thousands, if not millions, to work for or become entrepreneurs. The award winners can become the country’s new force for competitiveness, economic innovation and employment.”
The winners were in Lagos for the two-day Nigeria50 Awards & Summit from March 21-22. The Summit was an action packed two days featuring the Nigeria50 along with prominent speakers, panel discussions, networking sessions, and Nigeria50 Awards Event. Over 150 representatives from the winning companies were in attendance and close to 200 VIPs and influencers.
ABOUT SIGNAL ALLIANCE LTD
Signal Alliance is an end-to-end IT Company with specialization in systems integration and has grown to be a most vibrant, forward moving ICT company in Nigeria with offices in Lagos and Abuja. With our highly skilled and certified consultants, we have extensive industry experience spanning across major sectors of the Nigerian industry.
With major strategic partnerships with World industry giants such as Microsoft, Cisco, CA Technologies and SAP, Signal Alliance prides itself on its ability to gain a thorough understanding of clients’ businesses using appropriate technology as a bridge between where the client is and where it wants to go. Over the years, Signal Alliance won numerous awards, including Microsoft Country Partner of the Year, Cisco Certified Premier Partner, CA Certified Gold Partner, etc.
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Aviat Networks, Inc., the leading expert in microwave networking solutions, has announced that it delivering on orders worth over $10 million for a combination of microwave backhaul equipment and services to enhance the public safety network of one of the largest city municipalities in the United States. This win reinforces Aviat’s position as the most trusted supplier for first responder/emergency microwave systems. A large proportion of the revenue was recorded in the company’s second fiscal quarter with the balance to be spread over the next two to three quarters.
The network supports the city’s police, firefighters and other first responders on a multi-agency wireless system. Aviat is installing Eclipse IRU 600 and Eclipse ODU 600 radios to provide seamless migration to IP/MPLS and LTE while supporting the mission-critical requirements of existing TDM traffic, which will fully enable interagency communications critical in addressing challenges during natural disasters, terrorist attacks and other large-scale first-responder challenges.
In addition to improving inter-agency communications, the network will provide infrastructure capable of supporting the state’s future LTE network and associated high-bandwidth applications such as video. According to a November 2012 public safety LTE and broadband market report by research firm Signals and Systems Telecom (SNS Telecom), mobile video surveillance has a compounded annual growth rate of 20 percent over the next five years, amounting to an estimated $2.5 billion of global revenues in 2016.
“The public safety LTE infrastructure will need to support the next wave of in-field crime-fighting tools, such as mobile surveillance video,” say Tony Ljubicich, vice president of sales, the Americas, Aviat Networks. “This upgrade of the city’s wireless voice and data microwave backhaul will deliver LTE-proven bandwidth for video as well as other real-time applications such as fingerprint matching and identity checks. Moreover, it is set to be leveraged for integration into the statewide radio system when the time comes.”
This deployment by Aviat Networks is also significant for countries such as Nigeria, where the need to effectively respond securely and swiftly to security and other emergencies has become critical. With presence in 46 countries including Nigeria, Aviat Networks’ ability to deploy LTE and basic microwave backhaul solutions for national infrastructure for government and telecommunication needs is unrivalled.
About Aviat Networks
Aviat Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: AVNW) is a leading global provider of microwave networking solutions transforming communications networks to handle the exploding growth of IP-centric, multi-Gigabit data services. With more than 750,000 systems installed around the world, Aviat Networks provides LTE-proven microwave networking solutions to mobile operators, including some of the largest and most advanced 4G/LTE networks in the world. Public safety, utility, government and defense organizations also trust Aviat Networks’ solutions for their mission-critical applications where reliability is paramount. In conjunction with its networking solutions, Aviat Networks provides a comprehensive suite of localized professional and support services enabling customers to effectively and seamlessly migrate to next generation Carrier Ethernet/IP networks. For more than 50 years, customers have relied on Aviat Networks’ high performance and scalable solutions to help them maximize their investments and solve their most challenging network problems. Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, Aviat Networks operates in 46 countries around the world. For more information, visit www.aviatnetworks.com or connect with Aviat Networks on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
SOURCE Aviat Networks, Inc.
]]>In a bid to help corporate organizations cut IT operational costs, leading indigenous ICT solution provider Signal Alliance Ltd, has announced the introduction of its Cloud services for enterprise customers. Available today, Signal Alliance Cloud computing services represents a new generation platform, enabling businesses to rapidly provision and deploy computing resources and access data applications anytime, anywhere.
“The mission of Signal Alliance Cloud Computing services is two-fold: To make cloud-based IT services available to large, medium and small enterprises, and provide them the flexibility and support they need to do what they do best – growing their businesses,” said Collins Onuegbu, Chief Executive Officer of Signal Alliance. “We’re excited to bring this service to our customers.”
Using this innovative strategy, enterprise IT consumers now have the opportunity of deploying and accessing basic and complex computer applications and services on a pay-as-use basis.
Signal Alliance Cloud services enables easy access to virtual hardware and software through an Internet connection which allows businesses to pay little for their IT resources – rather than investing in expensive IT infrastructure such as servers, hard drives and software application licenses. This is because the Cloud service is an approach to computing that uses a shared pool of configurable resources to provide convenient, on-demand, virtual network infrastructure or software utilized as an ongoing service.
“With Cloud Services, we provide our customers the ability to access and safely store data applications from their Smartphone, tablet or PC while on the go,” said Desmond Omovie, Marketing Communications Manager at Signal Alliance Ltd.
“Businesses are increasingly realizing the benefits of moving their network into a data center environment, simply for the fact that there’s little investment,” said Emeka Nwigwe, Head - Data Center and Collaboration at Signal Alliance Ltd. “Utilizing this type of facility benefits both small and large businesses by lowering risk and cost, while allowing IT personnel to focus on the specific needs of the company rather than data storage”, said Emeka.
Signal Alliance’s cloud computing team comprises of experienced hands with high knowledge of cloud services. The team boasts of a complete and in-depth knowledge of the business and technology angles of cloud solutions and demonstrates expertise in providing a balanced analysis of cloud computing risks, benefits as well as specific strategies and roadmap suitable to organizations.
The company also provides delegated administrator’s services, which enables customers focus on the core of their business without having to spend time and extra resources involved in running an IT unit. The Signal Alliance Cloud Computing services offer a variety of flexible, cost-effective options that combines applications, services and 24/7/365 local support for businesses.
For More information about Signal Alliance Cloud solutions:
Please visit www.signalalliance.com/cloudcomputingservices
Or email: desmond.omovie@signalalliance.com
]]>As part of the activities marking their annual customer appreciation week, Nigeria’s leading enterprise solutions and systems specialists Signal Alliance has embarked on various activities meant to show appreciation and commitment to their existing customer base. With visitations scheduled for her plethora of clients drawn from banking, insurance, manufacturing, aviation, energy and public sectors of the economy, the company once again has demonstrated its customer relationship abilities.
These activities, which started with visitations to some key customers of Signal Alliance has seen the company visiting the likes of Union Bank Plc., Mansard Insurance, Pan Ocean, Dangote group, Nigerian Breweries, Aero Contractors, etc, within the period of the Customer week.
Justifying the importance of this annual exercise, the managing director of Signal Alliance Collins Onuegbu explained that though information technology activities tends to eliminate the personal touch needed in business relationships, Signal Alliance devised this scheme to bring back the age long means of interacting with customers. “We can’t let machines rule everything in our life and that’s why we take out time to physically visit our esteemed customers and show them, as humans, that we appreciate doing business with them as well as reward them for sticking with us as preferred service provider” he said.
In addition to using these visits to appreciate their customers, which has taken a better part of the week, the company is also using the visitation to reward their customers by offering free services via Gift Vouchers to their customers. According to Desmond Omovie, the company’s head of branding and marketing communications, the Gift vouchers contain four specialized offers from Signal Alliance each worth at least US$3000.
He said: “We are offering them free services in either of Infrastructure Network Assessment, Unified Communications Pilot Assessment, Enterprise Cloud Readiness Assessment or SharePoint Deployment Planning Services”. Even though these services represent a profitable aspect of the business, Mr. Omovie believes that offering them free to their customers as part of the benefits of the customer week is another way Signal Alliance shows that retaining the goodwill and productivity of their customers far outweighs the financial gains in the business.
Reacting to the gesture on behalf of some of the customers of Signal Alliance, the Group Head IT of Union Bank PlcMr. Peter Iwegbu, thanked the management and staff of Signal Alliance for the visit and reiterated his appreciation of the professional relationship that exists between both companies.
Activities for the Customer Week rounded up with a visit to the Little Saints Orphanage in Lagos as well as a Breakfast Meeting with industry experts and customers of Signal Alliance in Lagos.
]]>Lagos – December 10th, 2012. The 2012 Cisco Collaboration Forum hosted by Signal Alliance at the Victoria Crown Plaza Hotel, Victoria Island Lagos on Tuesday, 4th December was hailed as a resounding success by all who attended the event and is one of the latest additions to Signal Alliance portfolio of customer engagement forums.
The seminar was designed to explore the use of technology to foster a culture of collaboration in light of an increasingly mobile, social, visual, and virtual world. Customers from the financial, Oil & Gas, Insurance, Manufacturing and Public sector share and discuss challenges, while trends, solutions, and best practices, as well as communication capabilities that are shaping the collaboration experience were presented to address these issues.
“Today’s businesses need to close the collaboration productivity gap created by today’s borderless enterprise with its highly distributed, mobile, and empowered workforce. Technology-enabled collaborative solutions are key to enabling collaborative business processes and putting people back at the center of work” explains Desmond Omovie, Marketing Communications Manager at Signal Alliance Ltd.
Key areas explored during the forum includes how Cisco technologies including unified communications, business video, and Web 2.0 applications make collaboration possible, and close the gap by eliminating the barriers of distance and time so organizations can shorten decision times, accelerate innovation and build agility, productivity, and competitive advantage.
About Signal Alliance.
Signal Alliance is an end-to-end IT Company which specializes in systems integration and has grown to be a most vibrant, forward moving ICT company in Nigeria with offices in Lagos and Abuja FCT. We have solid industry experience spanning across the major sectors of the Nigerian industry. Signal Alliance offers the services of its highly skilled and certified consultants.
Signal Alliance provides you with specialized services and solutions to meet your organization’s ICT expectations. We guide you through from the basic skeletal infrastructure needed to build upon to a complex and unified intelligent system to integrate your business processes.
With major strategic partnerships with World industry giants such as Microsoft, Cisco and CA Technologies, Signal Alliance prides itself on its ability to gain a thorough understanding of clients’ businesses and using appropriate technology as a bridge between where the client is and where it wants to go.
For more details, please contact:
Desmond Omovie
Desmond.omovie@signalalliance.com
0803693005
]]>Reported in the online press this last week was a rather odd statement issued by the Managing Director of Nigcomsat Mr Tiamiyu Ahmed promising Nigerians increased satellite bandwidth availability if its proposed Nigcomsat Bill is signed into law.
The oddity is that the reasoning behind the statement is at variance with contemporary economic thinking which informs us that a law more likely to actually increase availability of a service or commodity like satellite bandwidth would be one that allows for more providers of the service in the market, and not one that restricts the supply to a single provider.
My point is validated by recent history. Up until the 1990s the global Satellite Communications market was an oligopoly dominated by less than a handful of Inter-Governmental Organisations (IGOs) such as Intelsat, Eutelsat and Inmarsat, but by the late 1990s new European telecommunications laws liberalised and opened up the Satellite business to more players.
The effect was that cost of access to satellite bandwidth reduced from $15,000 per month to less than $200 per month within three years, and more satellite based service applications became available as more people bought a VSAT. Subsequently those IGOs were fully privatized.
With respect to the on-going debate over the proposed Nigcomsat Bill, it would be important to note that in any appraisal of the future prospects of Satellite Communications in Nigeria the goal should not be towards reinventing technology that already exists and is widely available globally. The objective instead should be how to apply this technology successfully in Nigeria.
Therefore, under the current regulatory regime the question of the viability and availability of Satellite based telecommunications in Nigeria should be more about business management acumen than about legislative power.
Nigerians would have expected the campaign for a Nigcomsat Bill to begin with a report justifying the desirability of the continued existence of Nigcomsat Ltd as a government company based on factual achievements of the company since the past six years of its establishment.
Regrettably we find ourselves instead in this muddle where the management of Nigcomsat is seeking a blanket law to protect their business whilst increasingly unable to precisely articulate their business model. They seem to at some times want to be one thing and at other times want to be everything.
Across the spectrum of the Satellite Communications business there are a wide range of business models delivered by different business entities playing various roles depending on their focus and competency. Focus is critical to existence of any Satellite venture and such focus will be dictated by technology choices made by the management of each company.
If for example, in deciding its route to market a Satellite Operator chooses to adopt an unorthodox technology platform for a geosynchronous orbital Satellite, it would have to tailor its entire business model accordingly. The operator would have no room within its service ecosystem to deliver end-user applications more suited to an alternative technology platform such as Low Earth Orbiting Satellites.
Therefore the choices made at a certain level by the Satellite Operator and its consequent business model will affect the quality and quantity of service delivered to the end user.
I have had raw personal experience of this. In 2008, before the collapse of the Satellite our company was contracted to acquire 75% of the L-Band capacity of Nigcomsat-1 to be used to deploy a novel technology application in Nigeria. Whilst this application is quite commonplace in many western countries, the Nigcomsat-1 platform presented us with a daunting challenge due to the unusual, if not flawed configuration of its L-Band service.
We could not find one single MTU hardware supplier in the world compatible with Nigcomsat-1 to support our application. Based on altruistic patriotic sentiment we doggedly insisted on partnering with Nigcomsat to develop from scratch an all-Nigerian solution and our project budget quadrupled. We saw the risk yet we chose Nigcomsat and that choice precipitated the collapse of our business.
In hindsight, the design of Nigcomsat-1 was so awkward it should have been no surprise to anyone that it was declared out of service before it could serve any useful purpose, but that is a different matter.
Suffice to say that given the opportunity we would not make the same choices again, but then with the proposed introduction of this Nigcomsat Bill budding enterprises like ours would have no options, our choices would have been dictated to us. Even worse, the choices would be dictated by an organisation with a proven record of incompetence at making such choices.
What is being proposed in this Bill is a denial of the choice of technology for an entire industry. It is as bizarre as it is audacious.
To surmise a probable explanation for this contentious Bill we need to have an appreciation of the volatile risks inherent in the Satellite communications business and its absolute requirement for managerial talent with an ability to accurately balance technology choices with market application and user experience.
It usually is a very delicate mix, which if inappropriately applied inevitably leads to a catastrophic collapse of the entire venture. A notable International example being Motorola and its Iridium satellite system now confined to the global corporate cemetery.
In the particular case of Nigcomsat it is quite obvious that having learnt this lesson from the Nigcomsat-1 misadventure, the legislative route presents its management a sure way to hedge against these risks in the future by ensuring that should they miscalculate again the Company would be assured a continued existence by law, hence the surreptitious passing of the proposed Nigcomsat Bill through the House of Representatives.
In a technologically dynamic world the idea of creating a special law establishing a sole technology provider for the Country is ill conceived and primitive.
The proposed Nigcomsat Bill is both unnecessary and injurious to the economy. In fact, Nigcomsat does not need any new law; rather it would do well with a dose of transparency and accountability. And, even better with some local competition.
There is today a gaping vacuum in the Satellite market in Nigeria and certainly new competitors to Nigcomsat are coming to fill this vacuum. What Nigcomsat is seeking with this law is to compensate for their apparent shortcomings by changing the rules in their favour to undercut the competition.
In the overall interest of the nation, the technology choices necessary to develop the vast potential of the Nigerian satellite communications industry can be best taken by entrepreneurs in a liberalised market under the reins of investment capital and not by government appointees under the cloak of legislative fiat.
Sam IGWE, is the CEO Sahara Bells Communications Ltd, No.2 Woodberry Grove
London N12 UK.
He can be reached at: sam@saharabells.net
Following the expression of interests from more stakeholders in the telecommunications sector to be part of the deliberations at the Nigerian ICT Summit series on Mobile Number Portability earlier scheduled to hold on Wednesday 26th September at the Golden Gate Paradise, Ikoyi Lagos, the organizers of the event, Private Media Mart Limited and Princelink Communications have announced a new date of October 26th. This is even as NCC and its technical partners on MNP are scheduled to be actively involved in the event.
The event, tagged Number Portability – opportunities and pitfalls, according to the CEO of Private Media Mart Limited, Mr Ejiofor Agada was being organized to give adequate interpretation to the Number portability regime which the country is about to adopt.
Agada said that many subscribers were lost on what they stand to gain when Number portability is implemented in Nigeria and were beginning to entertain unnecessary and unwarranted fears, due to low awareness created for the system in Nigeria.
He noted that the overwhelming interests as well as different questions the subscribers and other stakeholders were expressing since the event was announced clearly indicated that people needed to know more about this system.
For Agada “we regret to announce the shift in date of this event. But it is all for good because we want to accommodate every stakeholder that can add value to the reason the event was muted in the first place as the sheer number of questions received daily about this event, clearly shows that there needs to be more awareness created for the subscribers on Number Portability.
“We are giving opportunity for more speakers and more participants so that at the end of the day, Number portability would have been demystified totally for the benefit of even the commonest subscriber” he added.
Corroborating, the event coordinator, Mr Prince Osuagwu, added that “this is not actually postponement in the real sense of it. It is just a deliberate shift in date to ensure that no stone is left unturned in making every Nigerian subscriber understand where he or she stands in the proposed Number Portability regime”.
Osuagwu said that the event which has received the endorsement of virtually all ICT stakeholders and groups in the country, would not only help the subscribers but also would provide a platform for the implementers, the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, to educate all on the technical, operational and beneficial aspects of the proposed MNP to Nigerians.
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