Airtel gains most in August NCC subscriber porting data 

Saviour Adugba

Indian controlled mobile telephone service provider, Airtel, gained most among its competitors in the number of subscribers who chose to leave their networks in search of better services elsewhere, the August subscriber porting data released by the regulator, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has shown.

According to the data, Airtel welcomed 9,927 new porting subscribers for the month of August while MTN, the network with the second most incoming porting activities welcomed 5,188 incoming subscribers from other networks. 9mobile received 5,188 new subscribers from other networks to place third, while Globacom received a paltry 677 incoming subscribers in the month of August.

On the flip side, Globacom leads the pack in the number of subscribers lost to other networks, losing a significant 6,818 subscribers for the period under review. Airtel lost the second most subscribers to other networks, losing 5,277 subscribers to other networks, while 9mobile lost 4,507 subscribers, placing it in the third position as the company to lose the most subscribers. MTN lost the least amount of subscribers, losing 4,469 subscribers in August.

With Airtel leading the pack in the number of incoming porting subscribers, it may well be an indication that the telecom service provider is now gaining a strong ground to be seen as the network of choice for porting subscribers, as it has kept that position for the second month, after 9mobile stayed as the network of choice after snapping the position from Airtel in December 2019.

Mobile Number Portability (MNP) is a feature that was introduced by the NCC to give subscribers the option of leaving a network service provider that they are dissatisfied with, and joining another network without having to lose their phone numbers.

Although the service has not enjoyed as much success as it was projected to, it has however served as a useful measure of the temperature of consumers’ service satisfaction or dissatisfaction.

In a related development, it has emerged that MTN remains the largest player in the Nigeria telecoms industry by market share with the South African owned company growing their subscriber base to 83,083,913 in August, meaning that the company now holds 40.90 per cent of the market.  

Airtel comes next, slightly beating Globacom to the second position in terms of market share, boasting of 26.96 per cent share of the market with 54,766,947 telephone subscribers. GLO is the third biggest player in the industry with 52,934,089 subscribers amounting to 26.06 per cent of the market share. EMTS, doing business as 9mobile is the company owning the least amount of market share with 12,377,612 subscribers amounting to 6.09 per cent of the market.