Despite preparing for a commercial relaunch in January 2026, the business that purchased Nigeria’s bankrupt national carrier, NITEL, NatCom Development and Investment Ltd (trading as ntel), may encounter industry challenges.
There are worries about how the telecom will be able to survive in the nearly saturated market that has been dominated by the current companies, in addition to the fact that it has been inactive for a number of years, which has given its rivals enormous opportunities to investigate the country’s industry.
It is hard to conceive the niche market that Ntel would be using to draw in a significant number of clients, given that it already has over 170 million members and is still vying for more.
Starlink’s complete nationwide entry and operation of satellite services is another annoyance. Due to Starlink’s superior capabilities and innovative service in Nigeria, major telecom providers MTN, Glo, Airtel, and T2 have been unsettled.
Ntel recently announced that it would resume commercial operations by early 2026 following the acquisition of another tranche of secret cash.
The Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) reportedly provided the finance, which is the most recent development in the government organization’s ongoing effort to keep the telecom business afloat.
After years of insolvency, AMCON, which owns a controlling 55 percent interest, took over complete management control of Ntel in 2024. In August 2025, it reportedly invested N30.72 billion as part of a phased rehabilitation strategy.
In order to reintroduce ntel as an asset-light, infrastructure-focused player in Nigeria’s telecom market, the company is leading a comeback.
Speaking recently at a Technology Times-organized event, Soji Maurice-Diya, the CEO of ntel, promised that the once-dormant Nigerian telecom company will formally re-enter the country’s telecom market in the first quarter of 2026 under a revised strategy that positions it as a “digital-first, infrastructure-light MVNO focused on innovation, inclusion, and sustainability.”
According to him, the company’s re-entry signifies “the beginning of a new chapter not just for ntel, but for Nigeria’s telecoms industry as a whole.” To give it our all, we must make this adjustment. Instead of trying to catch up, we want to be leaders in the field.
“Digital inclusion needs to be powered by sustainability, not subsidies,” he declared. “The rural opportunity is enormous, but we need more intelligent, localized broadband delivery models to unlock it.”
In keeping with President Bola Tinubu’s objectives, AMCON’s intervention represents both a financial stabilization effort and an attempt to save vital national telecom assets.
Despite the CEO’s overwhelming assurances, the service provider may find it extremely difficult to recover profitably due to the state of the economy and the market.
Undoubtedly, NITEL possessed extensive equipment and infrastructure throughout the nation when it was purchased by Ntel, but this infrastructure is insufficient for the dynamic operational ecology that exists today.
Launched in 2016 after NATCOM Development and Investment Limited (NatCom) paid $252.25 million to acquire the government-owned NITEL, ntel is a spinoff. Ntel has been having trouble getting back on track ever since the takeover.
Nigeria’s telecom companies have struggled over the years to provide high-quality service in the face of rising operating costs until early this year, when a price increase was implemented to alleviate their predicament. However, network providers now face everyday obstacles in trying to keep millions of Nigerians connected, including power outages, vandalism, and fiber outages. Infrastructure and profitability are under tremendous strain as a result of these problems, and operators are being forced to reconsider how they run networks nationwide.
Reports state that a capable leadership group has been assembled to revive the business. The previous CEO of American Tower Nigeria, Soji Maurice-Diya, was chosen to head the business.
Mr. Maurice-Diya, who has a wealth of leadership expertise in a variety of industries, including telecom infrastructure (ATC), oil (ExxonMobil), technology (IBM), consulting (EY), and entrepreneurship (as co-founder of Hash App), is expected to spearhead the implementation of this turnaround strategy.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has granted the telco a license for Unified Access Services.
“How comfortable will it be for ntel which has been inactive over the years if the long-existing operators have been battling the industry challenges without significant success?” is the question that industry observers are posing.
