Troubled mobile phone operator Cell C wants to transform itself into a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO).
Cell C is unable to compete against bigger rivals, Vodacom, MTN and Telkom. In the year ended-May 2019, Cell C reported an after-tax net loss of R8 billion.
Its woes are having a negative impact on JSE-listed Blue Label Telecoms, which owns almost half of the mobile phone company.
Blue Label Telecoms has written off its entire investment in Cell C to zero.
In an interview with Financial Mail, Cell C CEO Douglas Craigie Stevenson revealed the company’s turnaround plan.
After years of losses, and billions squandered, it has become clear that Cell C has been unable to live up to the bold vision it articulated in 2001, wrote Financial Mail.
Craigie Stevenson told the financial magazine that Cell C is negotiating a new roaming deal with bigger rival MTN which will see it carry all of Cell C’s traffic.
Furthermore, the new roaming agreement will also see Cell C hand all of its towers over to MTN.
This will mean Cell C will no longer run its own network but will make it a large MVNO piggybacking on MTN’s network.
Craigie Stevenson told the Financial Mail that the deal with MTN is expected to be finalised by the end of October
Also read: Cell C: A Hodgepodge Going Nowhere and Blue Label Sinks Deeper Into Trouble
