Top Qs
Timeline
Chat
Perspective
Africell Burundi
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Remove ads
Africell Burundi[a] (French: Africa Cellulaire) was a mobile operator running the Tempo / Africell Safaris network in Burundi.
History
Africell was created around 2000 by Bernard Busokoza. [b][2] The company obtained a GSM and WiMax license, and provided service under the network name of SAFARIS.[3] In 2006 Africa Cellulaire received a term loan of US$1.569 million from the Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank to partly finance expansion of their GSM network nationwide.[4]
In January 2008 VTEL Holdings of Dubai completed its acquisition of Africell of Burundi.[3] VTEL Holdings owned an 81% stake in the company.[5] VTEL Holdings owned the Tempo and Africell Safaris brands.[6] In 2010 Onatel Burundi formed a consortium with other Burundian telecommunications companies including Africell, U-COM Burundi, CBINET and Econet Wireless to build the Burundi Backbone System (BBS) fiber optic network.[7]
Africell's GSM network operating license expired on 16 September 2014. On 1 October 2014 the Telecommunications Regulation and Control Agency (ARCT) asked Africell if it wanted to renew its license fo US$10 million. In a letter of 6 October 2014 Mehieddine Makkaoui, CEO of Tempo Africell, told ARCT that the licence would not be renewed and the company would close its GSM service due to "difficult economic and financial circumstances". There were rumours that Vtel was negotiating a partnership with Onatel Burundi.[8]
Tempo Africell was closed on 16 March 2015 due to tax debt. Bernard Busokoza, founder and vice-president of the board of directors, asked for time to restructure. The Tempo Africell network continued to operate, but it was no longer possible to interconnect to other networks such as Econet, Lacell and Onatel. Customers were gradually moving to other nertworks.[9]
Remove ads
Notes
See also
References
Sources
Wikiwand - on
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Remove ads