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

mobile communications Mobile telephony is the provision of telephone services to phones which may move around freely rather than stay fixed in one location. Telephony is supposed to specifically point to a voice-only service or connection, though sometimes the l ...

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

Tanzania Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands and ...

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

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

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 in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means to ...

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

regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...

of Tanzania services. The Tanzanian telecom market is one of the most competitive markets in Africa and Tanzania has over 71% 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 mar ...

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 fourth president of Tanzania, in office from 2005 to 2015. Prior to his election as president, he was the Minister for Foreign Affairs from 1995 to 2005 under his ...

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. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...

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 bu ...

(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.

Viettel Group

Viettel Group is a

based telecommunications group. It is a

state-owned enterprise A state-owned enterprise (SOE) is a Government, government entity which is established or nationalised by the ''national government'' or ''provincial government'' by an executive order or an act of legislation in order to earn Profit (econom ...

wholly owned and operated by the

Ministry of Defence {{unsourced, date=February 2021 A ministry of defence or defense (see spelling differences), also known as a department of defence or defense, is an often-used name for the part of a government responsible for matters of defence, found in states ...

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

{{Telecommunications Telecommunications companies of Tanzania 2015 establishments in Tanzania Telecommunications companies established in 2015 Mobile phone companies of Tanzania

History

Viettel Group

See also

References

External links