A new infrastructure investment cycle is taking shape around Nigeria’s digital economy, with rising data consumption opening opportunities across fibre, telecommunications towers, renewable power, data centres, satellite services and digital infrastructure finance
Data consumption reached about 1.6 million terabytes in July 2026, representing an increase of almost 47 per cent in 12 months, while mobile subscriptions are projected to rise from roughly 195 million to 350 million over the next 10 to 15 years, according to observations at the Nigeria Digital Connectivity Investment Forum 2026.
The scale of the anticipated demand is forcing a rethink of how Nigeria finances and deploys telecommunications infrastructure, with industry stakeholders warning that cloud computing and artificial intelligence will place additional pressure on networks, data centres and, critically, electricity supply.
The warning emerged from the two-day investment forum convened in Abuja by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), in partnership with Swedfund and Ookla, under the theme “Unlocking Infrastructure Investment through Data, Transparency and Partnerships.”
The forum brought together government agencies, development finance institutions, investment banks, institutional investors, mobile network operators, tower and fibre companies, satellite and fixed-wireless providers, equipment manufacturers and industry associations.
Participants argued that telecommunications can no longer be treated as a narrow communications sector but as core economic infrastructure.
Telecommunications and information services accounted for 9.72 per cent of Nigeria’s real GDP in the second quarter of 2026, while mobile technology contributed about $240 billion to Africa’s economy in 2025, reinforcing the strategic importance of connectivity to productivity, trade and regional integration.
Nigeria’s position as co-champion of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Protocol on Digital Trade, and its status as the first state party to ratify the protocol, were cited as giving the country an opportunity to use its digital infrastructure as a platform for serving the wider African market.
But stakeholders said that opportunity will depend on whether Nigeria can mobilise the capital required to build infrastructure with asset lives stretching well beyond conventional commercial-bank lending cycles.
Bolaji Balogun, chief executive officer of Chapel Hill Denham, told participants that financing digital infrastructure requires projects that are genuinely investable, appropriate financing structures and greater participation by capital markets and long-term institutional investors.
Bismarck Rewane, chairman of the board of FCMB and managing director of Financial Derivatives Company, similarly highlighted the cost and availability of capital, investor confidence and policy predictability as critical determinants of infrastructure investment.
The forum noted that Nigeria’s infrastructure financing has expanded from less than ₦70 billion in 2004 to ₦19.4 trillion in 2025, but stressed that access to capital does not automatically make a project bankable.
One of the strongest conclusions from the forum was that electricity has become inseparable from telecommunications infrastructure investment.
For tower companies, participants observed, power is not a peripheral operating issue but a core component of the business. At the same time, expensive inland connectivity is limiting data-centre and internet-service investment largely to a handful of metropolitan areas.
The forum therefore called for energy and connectivity investment to be planned together, with clusters of telecommunications towers considered potential anchor off-takers for distributed power generation.
Participants also recommended that a financing framework for telecommunications power be established within 18 to 24 months, including standardised energy provision and the incorporation of telecommunications power into the protection framework for critical national information infrastructure.
The federal government was urged to accelerate Project BRIDGE, the planned 90,000-kilometre national fibre backbone, as a strategic response to Nigeria’s middle-mile connectivity deficit.
The middle mile, the infrastructure linking major network points to local access networks, was identified as one of the key factors constraining the expansion of data centres and internet services beyond Nigeria’s largest cities.
The forum also recommended the development of metro and access fibre under concession arrangements, mapped against existing infrastructure and integrated with Project BRIDGE.
Open-access and wholesale regulation was another priority, with the NCC expected to issue the relevant rules, publish a wholesale rate card and complete broadband mapping within six to 18 months.
Despite mobile broadband coverage reaching about 90 per cent of Nigerians, participants said the bigger challenge is increasingly whether people can actually use the networks.
Smartphone ownership was put at only about 27 per cent, while broadband penetration stood at 57.4 per cent, below the national 70 per cent target.
The implication, according to the forum, is that expanding network coverage alone will not close Nigeria’s digital divide. Device affordability, digital skills and consumer trust are now major constraints.
Stakeholders consequently called for coverage investments to be paired with measures that put affordable devices into users’ hands, including support for local manufacturing of devices and SIM cards.
The forum also put state-level regulation under the investment spotlight, particularly the cost and administration of Right of Way (RoW) approvals and site permits.
The pilot Nigeria Digital Connectivity Index across 12 states reportedly showed that RoW reform was associated with fibre growth ranging from 22 per cent to 95 per cent in reforming states.
The number of states charging zero for Right of Way has risen to 12, from seven in December 2024.
Participants urged state governments to harmonise and reduce RoW and site-permit charges, shorten approval timelines and adopt the federal model under which the operator laying fibre reinstates the road.
The NCC, Swedfund and Ookla collaboration was presented as an attempt to address another obstacle to investment—uncertainty over actual network performance.
Participants argued that national coverage statistics do not necessarily identify the constraint affecting users in a particular location. The forum therefore endorsed an approach based on national screening, local validation and post-intervention verification.
The NCC is expected to publish the first national Nigeria Digital Connectivity Index report, while advancing open-access and wholesale regulation and finalising its direct-to-device framework.
The use of independently verified network-performance data was also recommended as a condition for infrastructure financing, potentially giving investors and development-finance institutions a more objective basis for assessing projects.
With digital infrastructure assets typically having 20- to 30-year lives, participants said financing them predominantly through five-year bank tenors creates a structural mismatch.
Investors and development finance institutions were therefore urged to deploy longer-tenor naira capital, alongside blended finance and credit-enhancement structures that could make commercially marginal projects investable.
The forum also called for Universal Service Provision Fund resources to become the primary funding source for underserved-area projects, supported by blended public and multilateral financing.
Within six months, stakeholders want funding secured for community co-owned rural networks powered by renewable energy in zero-connectivity communities, through partnerships involving the Universal Service Provision Fund, state governments and the Rural Electrification Agency.
Over the following six to 18 months, the priority list includes building a business case for indoor connectivity in commercial buildings and incorporating data-centre requirements into the National Broadband Plan, including off-grid and renewable-energy solutions backed by blended finance.
The investment forum concluded that Nigeria’s connectivity challenge is no longer simply about deploying more telecommunications infrastructure. Financing costs, capital tenor, electricity, Right of Way, permitting, infrastructure data and device affordability are interconnected constraints requiring simultaneous action.
The NCC said it would continue engagement with government, investors, financiers and industry stakeholders to advance the agreed investment pathways.
