MainOne Boss Urges Stakeholders to Adopt ICT for Cost Efficiency

Following the steep slide in crude prices and the attendant effects on Nigeria’s economy, the Chief Executive Officer of MainOne, Ms. Funke Opeke, has advised the usage of information communication technology (ICT) for cost efficiency in Nigeria. She stated this in her presentation “Enabling Oil and Gas Production with Advanced Connectivity Solutions” at the Lagos Oil Club Q and A Session for January, 2015.

Speaking on the importance of ICT for the oil and gas industry, Opeke said: “The role of ICT is particularly critical in driving down costs and optimising operational efficiency in this period of falling oil prices. Oil and Gas companies need to adopt ICT solutions to maintain profitability.”

She added that global oil prices have expedited necessary fiscal belt-tightening measures. With federal government reviewing 6000 on-going projects and proposing doubling of Value Added Tax from five per cent to 10 per cent, she urged oil and gas companies to follow suit and leverage available ICT infrastructure in Nigeria.

Opeke also disclosed plans to extend the MainOne subsea cable to Cameroun with a branch in the oil producing Delta region. She emphasised how this would significantly improve connectivity services in the South-south region of Nigeria, enabling oil companies in this region to access the internet more effectively and also interconnect with their home offices. She specifically noted the importance of this project for enhanced connectivity of digital oil fields to MainOne’s premier Tier III Data Centre, MDX-i.

MainOne offers telecommunications services, which include data centre, co-location, global video centre, metro ethernet, managed services, global internet services and global Internet Protocol (IP) transit.