International operator beats competition from players including Zain and Orascom; sees potential for synergies in Africa.

Millicom International Cellular announced Monday that it has won a licence to offer nationwide mobile services in Rwanda.

The company revealed that it beat competition from three rival bidders for the $60 million, three-year concession, that will give it the right to operate as Rwanda’s third national mobile provider.

The licence will be held via a newly-created joint venture company, in which Millicom will hold an 87.5% stake. The remainder will be owned by locally-based Marathon Corporation.

“[Rwanda has] great potential for mobile telephony,” said Millicom president and CEO Marc Beuls.

“It is a very densely populated country with an extremely low mobile penetration, which will enable us to build out a network quickly and economically, and its strategic position between our operations in Tanzania and DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) offers potential operational synergies,” he explained.

Indeed, according to Millicom, Rwanda has a population of 10 million sharing a landmass of 26,000 square kilometres. The company claims mobile penetration stands at just 9%, although existing player MTN reported a subscriber base of 988,000 at the end of September, or close to 10% of the population.

In addition to MTN, Millicom will compete with incumbent operator Rwandatel, which is believed to have significantly fewer customers.

Whatever the true level of market penetration, Millicom sees great potential for growth, given the increasing levels of investment in ICT and wider infrastructure in the country.

Also in the running for the licence were Kuwaiti operator Zain, Orascom Telecom’s Telecel Globe, and privately-owned Sudanese company Larrycom for Investment, according to Rwanda Development Gateway.

– By Mary Lenninghan | Total Telecom