Vodafone turned one year in Ghana on 16 April

ADDRESS BY PAUL RYAN, DIRECTOR OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS, VODAFONE GHANA AT A MEDIA BRIEFING TO MARK THE ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF VODAFONE BRAND IN GHANA ON 19 APRIL, 2010 AT THE ALISA HOTEL, RIDGE, ACCRA.

Good morning ladies and gentlemen. I’d like to thank you very much for making time to come here as we officially announce the first anniversary of the Vodafone brand in Ghana. For our customers I say, “it’s your time”, this celebration is for them.

I’m sure you are all aware that Vodafone turned one year in Ghana last Friday 16 April. It’s a great moment for us at Vodafone and we want to share this moment with you, our friends in the media.

It was on April 16, 2009 that the Vodafone brand was launched at the Accra International Conference, here in Accra. Then, it was a new brand in Ghana in spite of its global weight. We went through some challenging times initially, that was always to be expected, but within a few short months, Vodafone has become the brand to talk about in Ghana. It is the brand that stands out and drives the telecommunications market in Ghana. It drives customer satisfaction, it drives innovation, it drives competition.

Customer excitement about the Vodafone brand is huge and growing.

Today, I’m proud to tell you that Vodafone is the fastest growing network in Ghana and a greatly admired Ghanaian company as well. Market figures show that over the past twelve (12) months, we have grown our subscriber base by 60%, ahead of total industry growth of 29%. We are also the No.1 in broadband services, fixed and enterprise, we say that very proudly.

So what has brought us this great early success? Two basic things: First Leveraging on the strong global Vodafone brand, Vodafone is the largest global communications firm and we bring to Ghana our technology; our training programmes and our unrivalled access to global products and services. and second investing heavily in Vodafone Ghana, in terms of technology, processes and people, driven by the demands of Ghanaian customers.

Vodafone has in the past one year, to invest heavily in the technology we use for our services and also bring some more excitement to our customers and the entire industry. As of December 2009 Vodafone had made a total capital investment of over 500m Ghana New Cedis or 500 billion old Ghana cedis in our telecommunication systems. While there is much more to do, and I assure you more is planned, already customers can experience improving quality and more and more innovative services. We will constantly improve and innovate. We fully recognise that this is only the beginning, we have made improvements but we have much further to go and we relish the challenge.

Of course we must remember we couldn’t get here without our shareholders, you the people of Ghana are our partner and of course you own 30% of this business.

I believe you all remember Vodafone’s first promotion which took Ghana by storm, the Rewards promotion. The rewards promotion was to give the signal that we in Vodafone promise and then deliver on our promises to our customers. That promotion was to give our customers a taste of what it is like to be part of the Vodafone family. That promotion included a grand prize of $1,000,000 (One Million USD) package including a well furnished house at the Trassaco Valley in Accra and a 4x4 vehicle. Don’t forget too that there were hundreds of other prizewinners who collected cars, scholarships, handsets, rewards that made a really positive difference to many peoples lives. To those winning customers we said “it’s your time!”

What we have been careful to do and do well, is to provide enviable customer service and product propositions that would give our customers the best customer experience. The introduction of the Vodafone mobile broadband service and our mobile broadband smartphones, the launch of the Vodafone Internet Cafés, the introduction of the Vodafone phone booths that has GSM services, among a host of other products, have been our way of making a clear statement in just one year. These are just indications of what to expect next from Vodafone and our way of becoming the network of choice in Ghana.

We all often focus on technology and service, none of this can be done without our people. We’ve worked extremely hard to become an employer of choice in Ghana. No wonder employees of other organizations and even our competition yearn to work with Vodafone Ghana. We leverage our global experience in Human Resource development to offer our employees first class training, development and opportunity that will make our people a competitive labour force, competitive with labour markets around the world. In addition we have created many jobs in the Ghanaian economy with strong Ghanaian suppliers such as Kingdom Books and Stationary Limited and CFAO.

So what’s Vodafone offering after one year in Ghana?

Our vision

• To be absolute number 1 communications service provider in Ghana as we focus on customer satisfaction and innovation.

In the market place

• we are focussed on all customers segments whether mobile, Broadband fixed and mobile, and enterprise and wholesale. Note that Number Portability, where we are the biggest supporter, will make a huge difference for customers and should be implemented as soon as possible

Vodafone Ghana Foundation and Community Activities

• The Vodafone Ghana Foundation was launched a couple of months ago as the charity arm of the Vodafone business. The foundation will, in the course of our anniversary programmes, launch what we call the World of Difference. Through the World of Difference Vodafone will sponsor some Ghanaian professionals and workers who will take some time off their work to support selected community activities of their choice in any community in Ghana. This will be really exciting and is part of a global programme which has captured the attention of the public across the Vodafone family worldwide.

So there you have it. Vodafone Ghana is here to stay. We are young and what you have seen so far in one year, is of course just the beginning. We are making a remarkable difference in the telecommunications industry in Ghana for Ghanaians. I have seen this as I travel the length and breadth of this wonderful country, meeting customers from Wa to Tamale, in the Eastern region and west to Cape Coast and beyond. I say to our customers, remember our company is your company, we are partly owned by the people of Ghana and through everything we do, together, we are creating value for the people of Ghana. Our company is heading towards profitability, not yet, as we continue to invest heavily, but we are in the middle of a remarkable transformation. A transformation we are extremely focussed on and all Ghanaians should, like us, be proud of our achievements to date, achievements which will translate into shareholder value, Ghanaians as shareholders in this business will benefit from this value creation.

In the weeks and months ahead, you yourselves will get a feel of the new customer experiences Vodafone promises. We are customer obsessed, our customers will increasingly admire us. Customers, It’s your time!

On our first birthday of the Vodafone Brand in Ghana I thank our staff for their dedication and I thank our customers for their loyalty and our shareholders both Vodafone Group and Ghana for their support.

We acknowledge the support of the media through the past 12 months, and expect this relationship to grow even better.

Happy Birthday to you Vodafone Ghana, Happy Birthday

Ayeekoo Vodafone ! It’s your time!