An Irish consortium today launched Jamaica's first GSM mobile phone service, Digicel. A total of $180 million will be invested in the project.
Mossel (Jamaica) is the company set up by the consortium which is headed by telecoms entrepreneur Denis O'Brien. The consortium also includes Ossie Kilkenny and Leslie Buckley. Mossel successfully bid $47.5 million for the country's first GSM mobile phone licence in June 2000 following deregulation of the Jamaican telecoms market.
The consortium said that with 125 sites island-wide it had over 80% population coverage, taking in all major cities and roads, and that it planned to set up a pan-Caribbean service of GSM networks. It is seeking other licences in the Caribbean. Jamaica currently had a mobile phone penetration rate of only 7% compared to 68% in Ireland, it said.
'As with any market that is beginning to open up to competition, we expect the launch of Digicel will greatly propel mobile phone usage throughout Jamaica and throughout the Caribbean as a whole,' the consortium said in a statement.
Seamus Lynch, formerly Director of Sales at Esat Digifone, has been responsible for the development and launch of Digicel. 175 Jamaicans have been recruited over the last nine months and are working with a team of 12 Irish executives on the Digicel project.
Denis O'Brien personally made $300 million from the sale of Esat to British Telecommunications last year. His eIsland consortium has tabled a bid for the fixed-line operations of Eircom.
