MTN Ghana is currently investing heavily in the latest switch technology called ‘The Blade Cluster’ to improve network quality and customer experience. The Radio Planning and Optimization Engineer of MTN Ghana, Bright Girentsi-Annku told editors and senior media practitioners that the new technology gives the MTN higher capacity and enables it to process calls at a significantly higher speed. He was speaking at a media interaction forum organized by MTN in Accra. Various telecom industry studies in the country indicate that MTN is number one in terms of coverage, market share and even network quality. Mr. Girentsi-Annku said MTN is also constructing two additional switch centres in Accra to give it the most advanced and world class switching facilities in the country and ensure reliability and better quality service to customers. “One of the new switch centres is already completed and the other is 50 per cent complete,” he said. Mr. Girentsi-Annku said MTN has also launched and operating a new internet protocol (IP) network called MPLS, which increases transmission speed and capacity, and provides unrivalled efficiency and quality for data customers. He said the company has also laid 1,800km of fibre, which is the largest among all networks, and is planning to lay additional 500km soon. Mr. Girentsi-Annku noted that MTN Ghana continues to be the market leader with 55 percent market share, carrying 60 percent of Ghana’s local and international call traffic. The Senior Manager for Corporate Sales, Mr. Abu Mohammed also told the media practitioners that apart from the 1,965 permanent staff of MTN, the company has also created 150,000 additional jobs through its sales and distribution outlets across country. This represents an increase of 30,000 additional jobs from 120,000 last year. He said MTN has also installed over 1,000 solar-powered community phones in rural areas to enable rural dwellers who do not own mobile phones. The community phones use SIM cards to make and receive calls, and also send text messages. Corporate Services Executive of MTN Ghana, Mrs. Mawuena Trebarh said so far MTN has spent over three million Ghana cedis (GH¢3,058,227.34) on corporate social responsibility (CSR) projects, particularly in health and education. She also outlined some support MTN has been giving the media, including being title sponsor for the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) Awards, the Sports Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) Awards, refurbishing the newsroom of the Ghana News Agency and also supporting individual journalists to attend international conferences. Story by Samuel Dowuona, Adom FM