ISLAMABAD – Pakistan Telecommunications Authority (PTA) has revealed that the country’s telecom sector accrued revenues of 552 billion rupees ($3.34 billion) in 2019.
The PTA announced this in its annual report this week, showing that the telecoms sector contributed around 96 billion rupees ($581 million) to the economy in taxation revenues.
With all most 163 million mobile subscribers, the country now has a mobile penetration rate of 76.4 per cent.
This time, Pakistan is served by four large mobile network operators, namely Jazz, Telenor Pakistan, Ufone, and Zong. Of these four, Jazz is the largest, with 59 million subscribers, followed by Telenor Pakistan with 46 million, Ufone with 23.1 million and Zong 15.6 million. The country is also served by a number of mobile virtual network operators.
It is being expected that the commercial launch of the 5G network will be started in the mid of 2021 as all four major mobile network operators have now undertaken 5G trials.
Irfan Wahab Khan, the Telenor Pakistan’s CEO, said that operators in the country must look to collaborate on 5G, sharing the financial burden through a series of network sharing agreements.
“The world is moving ahead and the telecoms companies were sharing far more things but in Pakistan, we are all still investing in basic structures, like towers,” he said.
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