Market News

 By : Adeyemi Adepetun and Ijeoma Akwuobi

• NIGCOMSAT Seeks Partnership, Targets N8b Revenue In Three Years

The Nigerian Communications Satellite Ltd (NIGCOMSAT) has decried the underutilisation of satellite broadband in Nigeria. NIGCOMSAT said while it hopes to generate N8 billion in revenue within the next three years through expansion of its broadband services, about 93 per cent of its satellite broadband capacity was still idle despite its wide applications in education, healthcare, defence, financial services and governance.

The Managing Director of NIGCOMSAT, Mrs. Jane Egerton-Idehen, disclosed this during a stakeholder roundtable organised by the company in Lagos on Friday.

Egerton-Idehen said broadband was the company’s most profitable but least utilised product line, with only seven per cent currently in use. She said: “We know broadband has greater value and wider use cases, from connecting local government offices to supporting education, defence, healthcare and even fintech. The challenge is that we cannot do it alone.”

She explained that while the country had recorded progress in broadband penetration, where utilisation rose from 35 per cent in 2023 to 75 per cent currently, NIGCOMSAT broadband remained largely untapped and required stronger collaboration with private sector partners.

The Guardian checks showed that broadband penetration (largely via fibre) was at 48.7 per cent with some 105 million Nigerians having access.   While the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) Executive Vice Chairman, Dr Aminu Maida, insisted that Nigeria could still meet the 70 per cent broadband penetration as enshrined in the National Broadband Plan 2020 to 2025, the country is 21.3 per cent away from meeting the target.

Egerton-Idehen said NIGCOMSAT has already shown capacity to deliver broadband services through special projects.

The NIGCOMSAT boss cited the provision of Internet to naval ships, moving vessels, and local government secretariats in remote communities where terrestrial networks could not reach.

According to her, under Project 774, NIGCOMSAT successfully provided connectivity to 45 local government secretariats across eight states within two months, a task fibre cable operators could not achieve at the same speed.

She stressed that NIGCOMSAT’s 250 staff could not cover the entire market, hence the need for channel partners and resellers with wider reach and distribution capacity.

“Our role is to provide the service backbone and support partners to take it to the market. We are not set up to compete directly with consumer operators because we don’t have engineers in every state to do installations and support.

“However, by working with partners, we can reach schools, health centres, fintech companies and government agencies across Nigeria and even in West Africa,” she said.

Egerton-Idehen also referenced successful examples of government-owned organisations operating profitably, such as Egypt’s NALSAT in the satellite sector and Nigeria LNG in the energy sector.

She said these examples proved that government companies could be both impactful and profitable. She told stakeholders that NIGCOMSAT’s N8 billion target was modest compared to global benchmarks.

“For example, NALSAT makes about $150 million yearly. If we focus and work with the right partners, our N8 billion target, which is only about $3 million to $4 million, is not ambitious at all,” she said.

The NIGCOMSAT boss gave assurances that the company would provide technical support, co-branded marketing and a flexible partnership model to enable partners to grow with the agency.

“This is the next chapter for NIGCOMSAT; we want to build it with you, our partners, because we cannot do it alone,” she said.