Did You Know? Airtel Nigeria Was Once Econet Wireless

Airtel Nigeria, the famed Smartphone Network has been officially operational in the country since 2010 after its resale for the umpteenth time. For those of us who were paying attention when the Global System for Mobile Communication (GSM) hit Nigeria – you know, those days when calls were billed at ₦50 per minute, Sim cards cost about ₦13000, and there was no 3G network or mobile internet to begin with. You’d recall that Airtel went through not one, not two, but six different iterative resales and identity changes before it ended up where it is now. Let’s take a look at how Airtel has evolved over the years, starting with the first telecoms company to launch in Nigeria, Econet.

Econet

Econet Wireless was the first GSM operator to go live in Nigeria and the first to be licensed by the Nigerian Communications Commission NCC. This was in 2001 when they were only two operators, the other being MTN. For several reasons, some of which are political, the company had to stop operations and leave Nigeria. Strive Masiyiwa, founder of Econet Wireless, recently took to social media to narrate the early days of Econet Nigeria and what exactly forced the company to leave Nigeria.

Vodacom

3 years after Econet launched, Vodacom stepped in and took the reins of the company in 2004 with a whole new management changed hands. However, their stay lasted a few months before it was cut short.

Vmobile

Vmobile side-lined Vodacom and took over management of the company in 2004. Vodacom eventually exited the country and Vmobile took full charge.  With the new management came new brand logos, marketing campaigns and other gimmicks to convince the now confused subscribers that things were still looking up.  

Celtel

After Vmobile’s 2-year reign, subscribers were thrown into another round of perplexity as yet another company – Celtel was taking over operations and management. In 2006, Vmobile Nigeria was acquired by Celtel, another telecommunications company, for about $1billion. This gave the Celtel a controlling stake of 65% in the company.

Zain

Zain Nigeria joined the business of handovers and hand downs in 2008, having completed its acquisition of Celtel for $3 billion. Consequently, the entire African operations of Celtel was rebranded from Celtel to Zain, marking the end of the Celtel brand. Zain was the 5^th company to take charge of the company first headed by Econet.

Airtel

After concluding a $10.7 billion transaction in June 2010, Indian telecoms company – Bharti Airtel acquired the Zain Group’s Africa Unit which included its telecoms company in Nigeria. This led to a fresh overhaul of brand name, brand logo, fresh marketing campaigns and so on.  Airtel Nigeria has remained in the country and is known for its good data network and fairly priced plans.

---

You might also like:

• Did You Know? – That King David was a Skillful Musician with 4,000 Music Ministers
• Did You Know? – That the Phrase “When Praises Go Up, Blessings Come Down” is not a direct quote from the Bible
• Did You Know? Nigeria’s Ancient Kano Dye Pits
• Did You Know? Sandie Okoro Is the First Female Chancellor of the University of Birmingham

This article was first published on 4th May 2018

---

---

Comments (0)