Nigeria: ICT - Nigeria Remains Top Investment Destination, Says Study

BY Unknown IN IN




Lagos, Nigeria
Nigeria may soon attract more foreign direct investment, FDI, particularly in the ICT sector, as Pyramid Research has just released the report of its 2013 top trends in global communications with a declaration that Nigeria still remained top spot for telecom investments in Middle East and Africa.
For 12 years, following the 2001 liberalization of the telecoms sector, coupled with favorable regulatory regime in Nigeria, the industry continues to witness significant growth in both investments and mobile subscriptions.
While local and foreign direct investment in the sector stood at $25bn in mid-2012, mobile subscriptions has surpassed over 150 million out of which 113.1 million are active at the end of December, 2012.
In the same vein, teledensity has grown to 80.21, giving the regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC the leverage to drive more investment in the country with various policies and frameworks on broadband infrastructure deployment, review of interconnect rates among the operators. Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah, had also reiterated that his commission was highly committed to engendering fravourable regulatory environment for investors.
Meanwhile, the Pyramid 2013 report said that Nigeria's continued retention of top investment economy in emerging markets was as a result of the growth projections envisaged by its study in the next few years.
The study, tagged 'Pyramid Perspective 2013: Top Trends in the Global Communications Industry', provides information on top trends in telecoms landscape in Africa and Middle East (AME), Asian Pacific, Europe and Americas. According to the study, economic growth in emerging markets is expected to be nearly quadruple the economic growth in developed markets. Telecom service revenue in emerging markets will increase five times faster than in developed markets.
Emerging markets to post higher revenue
The study predicts that this trend will make mobile service revenue in emerging markets in 2015 larger than mobile service revenue in developed markets for the first time ever as nearly 90 per cent of the 2 billion subscribers to come online in the next five years are expected to reside in emerging markets. The study affirms that "exposure to emerging markets has become a critical factor for success in an industry characterized by stagnation in developed markets, intense competition, consumer choice and disruptive business models,".
Vanguard