Zimbabwe's mobile phone giant, ECONET Wireless, is set to launch the first Third Generation (3G) cellular service in the country, placing the country among the few countries on the African continent offering the service.

The company's Chief Executive Officer Douglas Mboweni on Friday told the media that ECONET had ordered equipment from Ericsson for an initial capacity of 50,000 lines, which will be over and above the additional 300,000 lines for normal cellular service.

The company will start releasing the additional lines next month under its current 20 million U.S. dollars expansion program to increase network capacity, he said. He said the introduction of the service will not only be a welcome development for local business executives but will also completely transform the way Zimbabweans communicate within a few years. An added attraction was that businesses would become more competitive. Mboweni added that work on expanding the existing cellular service was progressing well.

The company had already developed 80 new base station sites which are now ready for the installation of new equipment, which was expected to be commissioned soon.

ECONET is planning to start releasing new lines by end of October and to have sold most of them by the end of January 2007.

Source: Xinhua