Helios Towers settles in Senegal and announces investment of approximately $ 200 million over five years
May 5th 2021
As part of its digital development strategy for the national territory, the State of Senegal will benefit from the technical expertise of the company Helios Towers. It will invest in improving telecom coverage, essential for the participation of all Senegalese in the digital economy.
The English telecommunications infrastructure operator Helios Towers has officially dropped off its luggage in Senegal. He signed a specification to this effect on Tuesday, May 4. The company is starting its activities in the country with a sizeable infrastructure portfolio, with 1,200 telecom towers acquired in September 2020 from the mobile telephone operator Free Senegal for 160 million euros. Senegal thus becomes the company’s sixth African market, along with Tanzania, Congo, DR Congo, South Africa and Ghana.
“An actor like Hélios Towers, through its capacity to invest in the sector, its good practices, its operational excellence drawn from a practice of ten years in other countries of the sub-region,” would come today to relieve the actors of the ecosystem, in the first place the operators ”, affirmed Karim Ndiaye, the general manager of Helios Towers Senegal. He also announced that the company plans to invest nearly USD 200 million in Senegal over the next five years.
In Senegal, the need for quality telecom services grew in 2020 with the Covid-19 and puts pressure on telecom operators to extend their network. New infrastructure needs to be built in many new areas that gain commercial value. But the unequal financial power of operators could leave this pressing need for telecom services unmet for a long time.
In terms of benefits, the provision by Helios Towers of its telecoms infrastructures at the disposal of Sonatel, Free and Expresso, in areas where their coverage is weak, will allow them to achieve operational savings. According to the Minister of Digital Economy and Telecommunications Yankhoba Diattara, this commercial collaboration is expected and hoped for ” a leverage effect which telephone operators can take advantage of to further lower prices” for the benefit of Senegalese.
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