The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has said that it remains optimistic that 5G services will be available by the fourth quarter of 2022 in the country.
The organisation’s head of Spectrum Administration, Usman Aliyu, revealed that the cleaning of the Bands is ongoing with the shift of the FSS users from the 3.4 to 3.8 GHz spectrum after the approval of the use of the Nigerian Communications Satellite by the National Frequency Management Council.
Aliyu added that 5G would improve many services with resultant effect on the nation’s economic growth in areas such as education, health, financial services and enhance the quality of service.
With the successful auction last year of the 5G spectrum, Nigeria come to be the first country in Africa to conduct a complete 5G spectrum auction without the assistance of a consultant and the first software auction to be executed since 2001.”
The 5G Spectrum auction of the 3.45 GHz spectrum was carried out in late 2021 and went through 11 rounds, exceeding the revenue projection from the reserve price of US$199,374,000.
The auction process ended when MTN and Mafab posted an exit bid of US$273 million, and Airtel posted a final bid of US$270 million. The auction made a profit of US$22.5 billion in all.
