Telecommunications group MTN is investing R749-million into its Western Cape operations to boost its expansion drive into rural and periurban areas and continue its major fifth-generation (5G) roll-out.

The top three targets for the province in 2022 are improving availability of the network, increasing data throughputs and expanding MTN’s 5G footprint, says MTN GM for Western Cape operations Paul Newman, noting that the number of 5G sites will reach 179 in the Western Cape alone.

“With improved access to data changing lives, our aim is to make significant inroads into plugging existing data gaps in South Africa. We are making major strides and our progress on network modernisation in the Western Cape is already almost 72% complete,” he says.

The boosting of coverage into villages and periurban areas is aimed at bringing network and connectivity services to people in the most remote rural settlements of South Africa.

Through this rural roll-out, MTN aims to have over 100 rural deployments nationally in highly underserved areas by the end of this year.

“Areas like Khayelitsha, Mitchells Plain and Philippi will benefit, all the way through to the Southern and Northern Cape. With the completion of the National Long Distance Cable project in 2021, major commuter routes such as the N2 will see a huge boost in network coverage,” adds Newman.

Amid the ongoing problem of battery theft and tower vandalism, R10.5-million will be spent on fixing damage caused by vandals in the province, with new battery installations costing R64-million also planned.

MTN’s heightened security and community collaboration strategy has seen a 50% year-on-year reduction in battery theft.

“With stable, reliable and fast connectivity so critical to the modern world, it is important we ensure disruptions to our network are minimised. We are making good progress, but we call on all consumers to remain vigilant and report any incidents they may be aware of to us or the police so that we can continue to bring uninterrupted digital progress to more people,” says Newman.

This follows on various announcements during March that MTN plans to invest hundreds of millions of rands to bolster networks across South Africa.

Some R700-million is being invested to modernise existing infrastructure and deploy new network infrastructure across KwaZulu-Natal.

The investment, which is in addition to the R500-million invested in 2021, will go towards expanding rural reach and 5G capacity, as well as the restoration of vandalised network infrastructure.

Another R820-million is being directed across Limpopo and Mpumalanga to modernise its network and deploy new infrastructure.

MTN’s Modernisation of Network South Africa project, or Monza, roll-out in the two provinces will include improvement and modernisation of 230 sites and 76 new site builds to add to the existing 1 850, while the extension of MTN’s 5G connectivity includes rolling out 58 new sites this year to add to the existing 53.