China wins $2,4bn Ethiopia telecoms deal

www.engineeringnews.co.za

08 September 2006

Ethiopia on Friday signed a $2,4-billion agreement with three Chinese companies to upgrade and expand telecommunication services in the Horn of Africa country, officials said.

The three companies are ZTE Corporation, Huawei Technologies and Chinese International Telecommunication Construction Corporation.

"The three year, 2007/2010, expansion plan aims at increasing the number of mobile services to 7-million from 1,5-million today and that of fixed telephone network from one million to 4-million," said Abdurrahman Ahmed, the information officer of the Ethiopian Telecommunication Corporation (ETC).

The deal also involves expanding Ethiopia's optical fiber network to 10 000 km from the current 4 000 km by 2010, he added.