Nigeria operates a fiercely competitive telecoms market. Perhaps it has the stiffest competitive landscape in the telecoms sector in the world. The question is why the telcos running on CDMA technology (Starcomms, Multilinks Telkom, Visafone etc) in this market are bleeding while the GSM big dogs (Glo, MTN, Airtel etc) are thriving? The CDMA guys had a 7 year headstart to Nigeria's telecoms market but complacency and elitism hamstrung them. I recall Intercellular retailing a cellphone in 1995 for N186,000. Only the really wealthy and perhaps drug barons could afford it at the time. The had the opprtunity to seize the Nigerian market fro themselves at the time but they were not creative, innnovative, and aggressive enough to offer serious value added services to Nigerians until real competitors entered the market in 2001. Now they are crying for their survival.

Come to think of it, Nitel with a 50 year head-start could not compete with the GSM telcos either. It has collapsed!!! What can be done to prevent the demise of these weaker companies? Cutthroat competition is not always a good thing(though I would like to see every other inefficient state run monopoly in Nigeria be exposed to competition so they can be brushed aside like Nitel)

No?