Mobile Operators in Afghanistan

 

Afghanistan, the landlocked country located in the center of Asia, comprises of a population of 29 mn. The telecom industry of the country has significantly shot up after the fall of Taliban and with the total teledensity reaching 65%, the growth which the telecom industry has encountered is really praiseworthy. As the operators and the regulators of the country are planning to launch 3G services as soon as possible, the war-torn nation is sure to emerge as a hot-spot for the telecom industry.

 

Mobile Operators and Subscribers

The total number of the mobile subscribers in the country reached 17.5 mn as of June 2011. The operators and regulators of the country are seeking a way to deploy 3G or even 4G services in the country. The country has 4 mobile operators:

1. Afghanistan Wireless Communications Company,
2. Roshan,
3. MTN, and
4. Etisalat.

Afghan Wireless, incorporated in 2002, was the first mobile operator in the country with Ehsan Bayat as the chairman of the organization. The operator boasts of its country-wide network and is the only one to reach that milestone. The operator provides its services in both post and prepaid format with many beneficiary offers for the subscribers like Yak Bar se, Friends and Family-which provides calling on selected numbers at low charges, Jawanan-an affordable scheme for youth of the country, night talk, etc.

The operator, on the VAS front, provides services like-caller ringback tone (CRBT) with a list of songs varying from holy Islamic content to foreign pop songs; Islamic portal, which upon dialing 786 provides namaaz procedure and information about the religion; contests and quizzes, enabling the customers with a chance to win prizes; SMS, GPRS, and bulk SMS, a tool for corporate subscribers with which they can reach to a number of people simultaneously at low costs.

The operator, with 20% stake of the government, also provides BlackBerry services enabling the business community of the country to access, compose, and forward emails using BlackBerry push delivery. The roaming facility of the company is available across 340 networks in 102 countries worldwide.

Roshan started its operations in the country in 2003 and holds a subscriber base of over 5 mn with its network covering 230 cities in all the provinces of the country. The operator on the voice front offers services like call management, missed call notification, voice mail, caller ID, call waiting, call hold, call forwarding, etc.

The operator provides BlackBerry services as well and was the first one to provide m-paisa in the country, providing the majority of the population with safe and secure range of mobile financial services.

The other operator, MTN, was the second company to receive the GSM license in the country in July 2006 through its legal entity Areeba and was later renamed to MTN in 2008. The operator's network has its presence in 30 provinces, covering 18 mn people of the country.

The company provides numerous beneficiary services like MTN play, offering the consumers access to contents like games, music, videos, etc; MMS; GPRS; Me2U, an SMS based credit transfer service allowing transfer of credit from one mobile to other; CRBT; voice mail, etc, in prepaid and postpaid format.

Etisalat Afghanistan is a 100% owned subsidiary of Etisalat UAE. The company flagged off its operations in the country in 2007 and has invested $300 mn till date, doubling its revenue every year.