MTN Business will add 50% bandwidth to its high network clients at no extra cost.
Customers who have 2Mbps access leased lines, or larger, will be eligible for possible dramatic increases in capacity, says Angela Gahagan, MTN's executive heading MTN Business.
She says the move is on the back of the final integration of MTN Network Solutions' networks and the company's recent acquisition of Verizon business. “This is the first stage for us. We don't envisage this will be the end of the changes.”
MTN bought out Verizon earlier this year and has been working towards integrating the companies and their infrastructure. She says the additional bandwidth is now available because of the redundancy and additions available on the combined networks.
The offer will be available for certain customers and MTN Business will work on the solution on a case-by-case basis.
However, the company says the capacity increases are not a result of the landing of the long-awaited Seacom cable.
Edwin Thompson, MTN Business's GM of infrastructure and technology, says that, while the company has bought capacity on Seacom, its long-term strategy is to take advantage of the West African Undersea Cable and the East African cable, Eassy.
Gahagan says access to the coming cables will likely spark other opportunities for MTN Business to cut costs. “This is just the first step; more aggressive changes will happen when other cables come in. We know our services are being used more and more, and capacity is pivotal to business requirement,” she adds.
While the additional capacity will be passed onto customers, those hoping to maintain their current capacity and preferring a cost cut, would not be accommodated. “We will look at doing something like that in the future.”
According to Gahagan, the company's customers have indicated they want more capacity at a better cost opportunity.
The company does expect good take-up of the solution among its customers; however, Gahagan says the network - in its current iteration - will manage the increased traffic. “It is 100% hand-on-heart scalable.”
While the offering is not a direct cost-cutting exercise, World Wide Worx MD Arthur Goldstuck says it is effectively the same as trimming costs. He says the solution will be a good market attracter and he expects good uptake.
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