Oman's MNOs in tower infrastructure sales
For many years Oman's mobile market was a duopoly between the incumbent telco Omantel and its challenger Ooredoo Oman. In February 2021, Vodafone Group and Oman Future Telecommunications consortium secured a license to operate the Sultanate's third network, with services being under the Vodafone Oman brand. The new operator has been able to extend its reach based on a tower leasing arrangement signed in 2020 with Oman Tower Company.Oman has a modern mobile sector which comprises substantial coverage of both 3G and LTE networks. In February 2021 Omantel launched commercial 5G services, while Ooredoo Group has a five-year framework agreement with Ericsson to develop its 5G platform across the Group's ten markets, including Oman. The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a spike in mobile data traffic, which prompted Omantel to upgrade a number of sites from 3G to LTE, as well as build a number of additional 5G sites.
While Oman's fixed broadband infrastructure penetration is considered low, it is being improved with the building of fibre-based networks as part of Oman's Vision 2040 program.
Oman has also established itself as an important communications hub in the Middle East, with access to numerous submarine cables including the 2Africa submarine cable, which should become available during 2023-2024. The 9,800km Oman Australia Cable running from Muscat to Perth, with the potential for a branch line to Djibouti, is making progress and is expected to be completed in December 2021. This additional infrastructure will provide considerable additional bandwidth.
The publisher notes that the outbreak of the pandemic continues to have a significant impact on production and supply chains globally. To various degrees, the telecom sector during the coming year is likely to experience a downturn in mobile device production, while it may also be difficult for network operators to manage workflows when maintaining and upgrading existing infrastructure. Overall progress towards 5G may be postponed or slowed down in some countries.
On the consumer side, spending on telecoms services and devices is under pressure from the financial effect of large-scale job losses and the consequent restriction on disposable incomes. However, the crucial nature of telecom services, both for general communication as well as a tool for home-working, will offset such pressures. In many markets the net effect should be a steady though reduced increased in subscriber growth.
Although it is challenging to predict and interpret the long-term impacts of the crisis as it develops, these have been acknowledged in the industry forecasts contained in this report.
The report also covers the responses of the telecom operators as well as government agencies and regulators as they react to the crisis to ensure that citizens can continue to make optimum use of telecom services. This can be reflected in subsidy schemes and the promotion of tele-health and tele-education, among other solutions.
Key Developments:
- MVNOs gaining a small market share;
- Helios Towers acquires 2,890 mobile towers from Omantel;
- Vodafone Oman receives its licence as Oman's third MNO, contracts Ericsson to provide and operate an LTE and 5G core RAN;
- Telecom regulator concludes significant telecom competition review;
- Two additional cable systems to be added to the Blue-Raman cable system;
- Ericsson secures 5G framework agreement with Ooredoo;
- Omantel launches commercial 5G services;
Table of Contents
- Key statistics
- Regional Middle East Market Comparison
- Market characteristics
- Market Leaders
- Market Challengers
- Market Emergents
- TMI versus GDP
- Mobile and mobile broadband penetration
- Fixed and mobile broadband penetration
- Country overview
- COVID-19 and its impact on the telecom sector
- Economic considerations and responses
- Subscribers
- Infrastructure
- Telecommunications market
- Market overview
- Oman Vision 2040
- Regulatory environment
- Regulatory authority
- Fixed-line developments
- Revision of the telecommunication regulatory law - 2011-2015
- Telecom sector liberalisation
- Second fixed-line licence
- Third fixed-line licence
- Privatisation
- Interconnect
- Access
- Universal Service Obligation (USO)
- Royalty fees
- Competition issues
- Market competitiveness report
- Mobile network developments
- Second mobile licence
- Third mobile licence
- Reseller/MVNO licences
- Roaming
- Mobile Number Portability (MNP)
- Spectrum allocation
- Mobile market
- Mobile market analysis
- Mobile statistics
- General statistics
- Mobile data
- Mobile broadband
- Mobile infrastructure
- Towers
- 5G
- 4G
- GSM, 3G
- M2M
- Major mobile operators
- Omantel/Oman Mobile Telecommunications (OMTC)
- Ooredoo Oman
- Vodafone Oman
- MVNOs
- Fixed-line broadband market
- Broadband statistics
- Fibre-to-the-Premises networks
- Other fixed broadband services
- Fixed Wireless Access (FWA)
- Fixed network operators
- Oman Telecommunications Company (Omantel)
- Ooredoo Oman
- Awasr
- Telecommunications infrastructure
- Overview of the national telecom network
- Alternative infrastructure
- VoIP
- National broadband strategy (NBS)
- International infrastructure
- Submarine cable networks
- Satellite networks
- Smart infrastructure
- Smart cities
- Smart grids
- Digital economy
- Data centres
- Cloud computing
- Appendix - Historic data
- Glossary of abbreviations
- Related reports
List of Tables
List of Charts
List of Exhibits
Companies Mentioned
- Oman Telecommunications Company (Omantel)
- Oman Mobile
- Ooredoo Oman
- Oman Broadband Company (OBC)
- FRiENDi
- Majan Telecom (Renna)
- Integrated Telecommunications Oman (TeO)
- Awasr-Oman
- Oman Future Telecommunications (OFT) consortium
- Vodafone Group
- Oman Tower Company (OTC)
