Data Revolution: How Globacom leads the pack in the mobile internet market

Recently, Globacom launched a new data pricing and bonus regimes called the Data Revolution. The purpose is to give subscribers what the company calls the unfair advantage. In this analysis, Bode Adewumi examines the contributions of Globacom to giving Nigerian subscribers unprecedented access to affordable and quality online communication.

 

Throughout the evolution of mobile telephone services in Nigeria, the fourth entrant into the market who came in as the second national carrier next to NITEL,  Globacom has always played a pioneering role.

In 2003, the company came into the market with the mantra of innovation operating with the 2.5G GPRS network, while others were running on the legacy 2G infrastructure. The 2.5G enabled Glo Mobile to offer superior quality of voice calls as well as Value Added Services (VAS).

With this, Globacom could provide value added services like M-banking, text2email, Magic Plus, Multimedia Messaging Service and vehicle tracking,  among other avant-garde and revolutionary services that others could not offer. Instantly, it imbued Nigerians with a sense of immense pride.

The network continued to blaze the trail and went on to launch the 3G network. The other networks eventually followed suit as they also launched both the Blackberry and 3G services, which Glo had earlier launched with great pomp. The era of 3G communication saw the explosion of data-based telecommunication and mobile internet services.  Innovations in the data sector became a game-changing phenomenon that gave Globacom a golden gilt edge. Globacom helped to place Nigeria in the league of online nations where business and social communication were done on-the-go.

However, one barrier existed between the subscriber and this modern and vast resource – cost of data bundles. While the bandwidth was available, customers often could not afford the cost of many services over the World Wide Web (WWW). Audio streaming, not to mention video streaming or heavy data usage for most internet data users was out of the question.

Not many data customers could afford to buy up to 1 Gigabyte of data bundle. Many depended on small plans that gave 100 or 200 megabyte  and at most 500 megabytes.

The coming of Glo-1 in 2010 addressed the inadequacy of submarine telecoms infrastructure in Africa. The landing of Glo1 translated into much faster and more robust connectivity for voice, data and video. This development and the launch of other submarine cables like Main One made bandwidth available and facilitated a drastic fall in the cost of doing data/Internet services. Globacom led the way to liberalise access to data, thereby making not only fast internet connection available, but also making such services pocket-friendly.

In January 2016, Globacom gave subscribers the Bumper Data Offer which increased the value of its data. It gave  subscribers 6GB data for the N3,000 data plan instead of 4.5GB  while a N4000 data plan was introduced with 9GB of data.

In May the same year, Globacom came out with another offer that gave free voice airtime to data subscribers.  One of the products, Talk Special, gives free data to voice subscribers  while Twin Bash gives  free talk time to data subscribers.

Later in the year, the telecom firm took the bull by the horn again and redefined the data market with new and difficult-to-beat data plans, offering mouth-watering, record- breaking data volumes for little sums in an aggressive pricing plan called Data Overload. In the new plan, subscribers to the network now receive up to double the data volume previously available on every plan.

As if all these were not enough, Globacom, on  November 6, threw open the barn doors for its subscribers for  a new season of excess data as the company once again blazed the trail by launching a new Data Revolution, which confers on its subscribers an unfair advantage with  unmatched data packages, the biggest ever in the industry.

At the launch of the Glo Data Revolution at the company’s headquarters, Mike Adenuga Towers in Lagos recently, Globacom’s Regional Director, Planning and Technical, Mr Sanjib Roy, said the new offer gives both new and existing subscribers who renew their subscriptions before expiration up to 4GB of data for just N1, 000. This 4GB data, for example, translates to about 4,000 pages of web browsing.

In the same vein, the 12.5GB is given for a N2, 500 data bundle. This, for instance, could be used for 250 hours of content broadcast.  Just as subscribers stand to gain 24GB for N4, 000 and a massive 30GB for N5,000, the 30GB for N5, 000 can enable the subscriber to enjoy videos for over 600 hours, for instance.

For smaller plans, new subscribers and those who renew with N100 subscription will have a 90MB bundle; while for N200, they will get 250MB with which they can send 400 emails for example. For N500, the customer gets a whopping 2GB of data, which the subscribers can use to do 10 days of unlimited chatting, if need be, Roy explained.

The new bundle offers are unprecedented and the biggest thing in Nigeria’s telecom history. Never has the subscriber to any network in Nigeria had it so big and so good. All one needs to do is get on the Glo data network and stay on by continuing to renew the subscription to enjoy the benefits that give you the unfair advantageover other data users.

Globacom also has made it possible for subscribers to watch movies free as it entered a partnership with iflix , the biggest online entertainment portal.  Explaining the Glo-iflix partnership, which is available on the Glo Café platform, Roy said beyond giving subscribers of the telecoms firm 60 days of unlimited access to the world’s best television programmes, series, movies, cartoons and more on their devices, after the 60 days, the Glo subscribers will get access at a specially discounted price of N100 per month only.  Subscribers need to send “Buzz” to 105 to access the iflix service.

Moreover, the company offers to subscribers who recharge up to N500 and above free YouTube streaming from 1am to 5.30am.  Youtube is a popular video-sharing site that allows users to upload, view, rate, share, add to favorites, report, and comment on videos.  All the subscriber needs to do is to dial *777# to buy a data plan to activate the services.

A cross section of Nigerians have described the Data Grandmaster, Globacom,  as a true friend of the people for reloading its N2500 data plan to give more value to subscribers.

Speaking on Glo’s repackaged plan, consumers have said  the additional data offer has enabled them to download more materials on the internet to aid their pedagogical task of imparting knowledge and make them better informed on a variety of issues. They see it as as cheering and economical.

On her part, Melody Oluwadara, a student of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, eulogised Globacom for always crashing costs to support the generality of Nigerians.

Also, Olamide Ajao, a Law student of the Ajayi Crowther University, Oyo town, Oyo State, praised Globacom saying, “With these promos, you get more value for your data purchase. This is a good initiative because it is highly beneficial to students who use data for research and for keeping up with the social media,” he added.

From the foregoing, citizens are excited that Globacom has reinforced their capacities to surf the net, do remote conferencing, upload and download pictures, sound and videos as they chase their passions with the unfair advantage afforded them by the grandmasters of data.