TOP STORY: MTN rolls out seamless roaming

In the East African region MTN Rwanda partners with MTN Uganda, Safaricom in Kenya and Vodacom in Tanzania to provide roaming services. This is believed to have boosted MTN Rwanda’s achievement of one million subscribers recently The MTN Group has announced the introduction of the company’s first seamless roaming network across all its 21 operations in Africa and the Middle East within the first half of 2009. This will be in a move to provide affordable communication.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

In the East African region MTN Rwanda partners with MTN Uganda, Safaricom in Kenya and Vodacom in Tanzania to provide roaming services. This is believed to have boosted MTN Rwanda’s achievement of one million subscribers recently

The MTN Group has announced the introduction of the company’s first seamless roaming network across all its 21 operations in Africa and the Middle East within the first half of 2009. This will be in a move to provide affordable communication.

With the seamless roaming, MTN’s pre-paid subscribers traveling through countries that operate the MTN network will recharge or top up their accounts using vouchers from the national MTN network of countries visited.

A statement from the Johannesburg based company says that all calls made by the roamer will be charged at the local rates of the MTN participating country. Subscribers will also receive free incoming calls and access Short Message Services (SMS) and other value-added services.

"The free incoming calls and local calling rates have also been extended to the post-paid subscriber base,” the statement reads.

In the East African region MTN Rwanda partners with MTN Uganda, Safaricom in Kenya and Vodacom in Tanzania to provide roaming services. This is believed to have boosted MTN Rwanda’s achievement of one million subscribers recently.

MTN Group in South Africa announced a successful commercial launch of the solution (seamless roaming) in three key operations in it’s West and Central Africa (WECA) region.

MTN Cameroon, MTN Ghana and MTN Nigeria have already launched the roaming solution and MTN Benin is scheduled to launch before the end of November 2008.

MTN’s seamless roaming follows Zain’s launch of its ‘One Network’, a borderless mobile network that connects its clients in Africa and the Middle East where the company has operations.

Nozipho January-Bardill, MTN Group Executive Corporate Affairs and Spokesperson said, "MTN One World is another effort that underscores our commitment to continually provide service innovations that improve service to our growing subscriber base and meet our customers’ needs.”

Christian de Faria, WECA region vice-president, says MTN recognizes the growing volume of travellers within the region and believes that MTN One World will offer MTN subscribers an appropriate value proposition.

"We are offering MTN subscribers free incoming calls whilst roaming in the participating networks and no need for SIM card replacements when traveling within participating MTN operations. We are confident that this convenience will benefit our customers and provide them with a unique MTN experience,” he added.

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