Tanzania has been in the news thanks to Airtel’s sale of 1,400 towers to Paradigm Infrastructure and SBA Communications. They are to join Helios Towers in owning a significant share of Tanzania’s nearly 7,000 towers. However, before Airtel announced its long-planned sale, a local MSP scooped up a towerco licence: Maktech. Maktech has been active providing tower services, in East Africa since 2001, primarily working for Vodacom. Now Godwin Makyao, Maktech’s founder, is setting his sights on developing towers to own and lease in urban and rural areas.
TowerXchange: First please introduce yourself “ how did you get into the telecoms business?
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
I’m the founder and Executive Director of Maktech, which has been around since 2001. I hold a bachelor’s degree in Electronic Science and Communication from University of Dar-es-salaam, Master of Business Administration from the University of Liverpool and am certified by Stanford University in Business Leadership and Transformation.
I got into the telecom business during the launch of Vodacom in Tanzania. While working at Vodacom I saw a gap in the market and decided to set up Maktech back in 2001
Our core business is to support the growth of telecommunications in Africa. Maktech is focused on telecom equipment deployment, maintenance and performance control. We are also now building network infrastructure for mobile networks in Tanzania, as well as in other parts of Africa. Our mission is to become the leading telecom contractor in Africa by offering affordable solutions and using local capacity.
I am determined to achieve my goals and targets which I set. I don’t believe in impossible, I believe in self-improvement, innovation and thinking harder for better solutions every day. I always set challenging objectives and I push myself and my team to attain or exceed them. I strongly believe in teamwork and set achievable stretch goals; although some are long-term in nature.
I believe in doing things right the first time though I am also very patient to achieve what I want. I can keep on doing what I believe until I make it happen and I believe mistakes and risks are part and parcel of the package. I am not scared of taking risks or failure just as long as I know my destiny.
I intend to expand into a total of seven countries by 2024 (Tanzania, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Madagascar, DRC, Congo B and South Sudan) which will be quite an improvement on the five states we are currently involved in (Tanzania, Mozambique, DRC, Congo B and Ethiopia).
In five years from now, Tanzania will be a leader among African nations in digital data usage, and Maktech will be there to make it possible.
TowerXchange: Please tell us about the history of Maktech and about your experience maintaining passive telecoms infrastructure “ what is your footprint, and how many sites do you currently manage?
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
MAKTECH AND TEL CO. LIMITED (Maktech) is a dynamic Managed Services Provider in the telecommunications sector, with its head office in Tanzania.
We are engaged in the installation and maintenance of telecom equipment. Over the years Maktech has made incursion into several African countries where we have been involved in the execution of large-scale telecom implementation projects: in Mozambique, Uganda, DRC, Botswana, Madagascar and Mauritius. We have experience implementing leading vendors’ equipment such as Nokia, Huawei, Ceragon, Ericsson, Motorola, Aviat, ECI and others. The scope of these projects has covered network rollouts, expansions, SWAP, upgrades and monitoring
We are a leader in managed services provision in the telecommunications sector in Tanzania. Our full-time staff enrolment in Tanzania stands at nearly 200 full-time team members. This is a phenomenal growth considering that at inception Maktech started with only four engineers.
We were entrusted by Vodacom to maintain about 200 sites from 2007 to 2010. We have successful maintained 400 Airtel sites. We are currently maintaining 149 Vodacom UCSAF sites and monitoring about 4,000 Vodacom sites.
*Airtel’s towers to transfer to SBA Communications/Paradigm Infrastructure JV
TowerXchange: What inspired you to apply for a towerco license in Tanzania? What is the market opportunity you think Maktech are well placed to serve?Â
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
In Tanzania, there is only one player who owns over nearly 4,000 of Tanzania’s more than 7,000 towers. However, Tanzania’s network is growing rapidly with about six MNOs active, thus indicating a huge opportunity in deployment of network infrastructure, with the population of around 60mn people which is expected to reach 80mn by 2030; the demand for network expansion is inevitable and all MNOs, government and other network owner will need more infrastructure companies to service them.
5G will create opportunities for Tanzania. We must find ways to deploy 5G infrastructure more cheaply and to expand network coverage too. 5G will be a gateway to creating smart cities and create an IoT network in Tanzania to support industrial development. Our model is focused on being the cheapest solution provider in order to deepen internet penetration in Tanzania, especially in the rural areas where most Tanzanians live.
5G’s network rollout is an opportunity to recreate and upgrade Tanzania’s mobile networks. For example, we can make our cities more beautiful by introducing camouflage towers to Tanzania for the first time. We can address network congestion at core urban sites through the sharing of antennas, base stations and active equipment.
TowerXchange: So you are also looking at opportunities to connect Tanzania’s villages?
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
Yes, we are. Development of rural areas must run alongside investment in cities. Deployment of rural low-cost towers using solar energy can be the anchor for the local development of dispensaries and other social facilities. We are currently working closely with UCSAF on a project to do analysis of poor coverage rural areas and planning for coverage to all villages with cellular networks. Our focus is to survey all rural areas and develop workable plans which can make it easier for Government and UCSAF management to make decisions quickly.
TowerXchange: Grid power is slowly improving in Tanzania, but what are you plans for maintaining availability where electricity remains unreliable?Â
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
Maktech intend to connect our sites to grid power, but we will also be investing in reliable backup systems like solar and batteries. Our rural sites will have lithium ion batteries with a hybrid solution which will ensure the availability of 24/7 power. Furthermore, we will deploy lithium ion batteries and effective solar panels to ensure that sites will run on solar and battery with the use of generators restricted to only when solar, batteries and grid are insufficient.
TowerXchange: Building towers is a capital-intensive business, how are you raising money and what is your capacity for building towers?Â
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
Initially, we will partner with local banks which have already shown interest to this project; this will drive us on with Phase 0 and Phase 1 of our plans; then we will be reinvesting as we grow our network. We will partner with MNOs with long-term contracts, and offer competitive lease rates which will ease their capex requirements as they move to an opex model with us. We will then invite in more stakeholders who have interest in investing in this project.
TowerXchange: In 2019 you were looking into building a 4G radio access network in Mozambique, are you still exploring active management options, or are you now focussing on the passive telecom infrastructure opportunity in Tanzania?Â
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
Yes, we are still exploring active management options. We have seen manufacturers of base stations looking to develop shareable base stations; for example Ericsson and Nokia. Manufacturers of antenna are also looking to create antennas that will allow sharing, like Kathrein. Ceragon has developed a TX infrastructure, IP5O that is capable of taking up to four clients. Once all technologies are in place and ready for deployment, we will further lower our costs.
TowerXchange: Tell us about your vision for the future of the company “ what would success look like in Tanzania and Mozambique and which are the next markets for Maktech?
Godwin Makyao, CEO, Maktech:
Maktech’s vision is to become the leading company for the provision of affordable solutions to telecom operators in Africa; affordable network deployment and management through offering low-cost towers. Our ambitions are especially large in rural areas and where the giant towerco companies have less appetite, which is why we are targeting Tanzania, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Madagascar, DRC, Congo B and South Sudan.
Most of these countries are still behind in technological advancement and more than 45% of their citizens are still either using primitive modes of communication or lack coverage altogether due to poor road infrastructure, lack of power and a level of economic development which does not justify the deployment of network in their areas.
The next markets for Maktech are Madagascar and South Sudan. In Tanzania, Mozambique, DRC, Congo B, Ethiopia we are either already established operations or expect to be fully operational by the end of 2021 or early 2022. Currently we’re fully registered and operational in Tanzania and Mozambique, while in the DRC, Congo B and Ethiopia we’re fully registered, having few projects running and expecting the execution of full scope by 2022.
