Africa-Press-Ethiopia
The Ethiopian Telecommunications Authority (ECA) announced that the deadline has now been reached for bid submissions for the two new nationwide telecommunication service licenses.
Following the authority’s’ request for proposals (RFP), published on November 27th, 2020, all final sealed bids and proposal from applicants have been submitted and the RFP process is now formally closed.
Addressing the occasion today, Director General of ECA, Balcha Reba said “We are delighted to have interests from established telecom operators from around the world”.
The telecom operators include Africa`s two telecommunication giants; MTN-the largest mobile operator in the continent and the Vodafone/Vodacom consortium including Kenya`s largest telecom provider, Safaricom.
Balcha stated that “We acknowledge the diligence and commitment from all participants in meeting the strict requirements set out in the RFP and for their engagement throughout this process.”
Accordingly, ECA is looking for the best all-round partners from the submitted bids and the authority is confident that competitive bidding will ensure that Ethiopia gets the best deal.
In responding to the RFP, each bidder had to comply with strict technical qualification criteria to demonstrate the company had the technical expertise required to manage license of this size in Ethiopia.
In addition, there were also strict financial and qualification criteria to show each bidder had the resources to manage a license of this scale.
Following the extensive review of the final qualifying submissions, the authority will select the winners of the two licenses and final public announcement will be made after the technical and financial evaluation is completed in the coming weeks, it was indicated.
