Viettel Tanzania Public Limited Company, trading as Halotel, is a

mobile communications Mobile may refer to: Places * Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city * Mobile County, Alabama * Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S. * Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels * Mobil ...

company, providing voice, messaging, data and communication services in

Tanzania Tanzania, officially the United Republic of Tanzania, is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It is bordered by Uganda to the northwest; Kenya to the northeast; the Indian Ocean to the east; Mozambique and Malawi to t ...

. It is owned by Viettel Global JSC which is the state-owned Investment Company from

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

investing in the Telecommunications market in several countries worldwide. It has invested up to $1 Billion into the Tanzania's telecommunications market. The Company was the first company in Tanzania allowed to lay its own

fiber optic An optical fiber, or optical fibre, is a flexible glass or plastic fiber that can transmit light from one end to the other. Such fibers find wide usage in fiber-optic communications, where they permit transmission over longer distances and at ...

cable and has placed over 18,000 km of optic fiber, providing all 26

regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as areas, zones, lands or territories, are portions of the Earth's surface that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and ...

of Tanzania with telecommunication services. The Tanzanian telecom market is one of the most competitive markets in Africa and Tanzania has over 79% mobile phone penetration. The company aims to capitalize on the providing a very wide coverage as quickly as possible and the company claims to cover over 81% of the country's area soon to be the higher than any of the major providers.

History

Halotel was launched in October 2015 and deployed in all 26 Tanzanian regions. This was Viettel's fourth investment in Africa after Movitel,

Lumitel Lumitel is a mobile communications company, providing voice, messaging, data and communication services in Burundi. It is owned by Viettel Global JSC which is the state-owned Investment Company from Vietnam investing in the Telecommunications ma ...

and Nexttel in Mozambique, Burundi and Cameroon respectively. Viettel started investing in the country in 2011 and planned $736 million in investment after the then president

Jakaya Kikwete Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete (born 7 October 1950) is a Tanzanian politician who was the List of Presidents of Tanzania, fourth president of Tanzania, in office from 2005 to 2015. Prior to his election as president, he was the Ministry of Foreign Aff ...

made a state visit to

. The goal of the

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a State (polity), state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive (government), execu ...

was to encourage rural mobile connectivity in the country where and the

saw fit to increase competition by allowing Viettel to operate in the country. The entry of Viettel also saw further liberalization of the communication sector, where the government allowed private companies to lay their own optic fiber cables. The company had promised to connect several public institutions around the country with the optic fibre network and connect over 1500 villages to the telecommunication grid that were previously not served. The company also tried to partner with state-owned energy company

Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited The Tanzania Electric Supply Company Limited (TANESCO) is a Tanzanian parastatal organisation established in 1964. It is wholly owned by the government of Tanzania. The Ministry of Energy and Minerals regulates the operations of TANESCO. Its b ...

(TANESCO) to use TANESCO's power poles to serve as antennas, however due to high costs the plan was abandoned. The company has successfully obtained licenses to operate its mobile money services HALOPESA to help it compete with Tanzania's well established operators.

Coverage

Halotel currently covers all regions of Tanzania with its 2G and 3G network via the 900MHz, 1800MHz and 2100MHz Frequency Spectrums and is on an ongoing deployment of telecommunication towers and sites to cover all regions with its 4G network. To improve on its 4G coverage and capacity, Halotel obtained additional 2600MHz Frequency Spectrum as auctioned off by the

Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority The Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA), established under the TCRA Act No. 12 of 2003, is an independent body responsible for overseeing the postal, broadcasting, and electronic communications industries in the United Republic of ...

in October 2022.

Subscription and Market Share

As of March 2023, Halotel boasts a total of 8,146,036 subscribers out of the 61.9 Million Mobile telecommunication services subscribers in Tanzania which is a 13% market share. Halotel through it
HaloPesa
mobile money service boasts a sum of 3,821,098 subscribers with access to the service in the country, a total of 9% market share in the Mobile financial services space.

Viettel Group

Viettel Group is a

based telecommunications group. It is a

state-owned enterprise A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a business entity created or owned by a national or local government, either through an executive order or legislation. SOEs aim to generate profit for the government, prevent private sector monopolies, provide goo ...

wholly owned and operated by the

Ministry of Defence A ministry of defence or defense (see American and British English spelling differences#-ce.2C -se, spelling differences), also known as a department of defence or defense, is the part of a government responsible for matters of defence and Mi ...

of Vietnam. The company has a customer base of over 75 million as of 2014 and made over $8 billion in revenue. ,the Group has subsidiaries in:

References

External links