… as MTN, Airtel tighten grip on telecom market
By AYOOLA OLAOLUWA
Nigeria’s indigenous telecommunications giant, Globacom (Glo), is facing one of the most challenging periods in its two-decade history, as worsening network quality, persistent service disruptions, and controversial management decisions trigger a massive subscriber exodus, Business Hallmark can report.
Once celebrated as the disruptor that revolutionized mobile telephony in Africa’s most populous nation with per-second billing and affordable data services, the company is now struggling to retain customers amid growing complaints over poor connectivity, dropped calls, and unreliable internet services.
Industry data and market trends seen by BH indicate that millions of subscribers have either abandoned the network entirely, or drastically reduced their usage, opting instead for competitors that offer more reliable services.
The development has significantly altered the competitive landscape of Nigeria’s telecom sector, with market leaders, MTN Nigeria and Airtel Africa, emerging as the biggest beneficiaries of Glo’s declining fortunes.
Both MTN and Airtel, available record shows, have recorded substantial subscriber additions in recent months, further consolidating their dominance of the market.
Performer Indicators
BH analysis of industry data compiled by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) indicated that 4,570 telephone subscribers changed network service providers in the first quarter of 2026.
According to the NCC report, the subscribers, apparently frustrated by the quality of service offered by their mobile network operators, dumped them by employing the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) scheme launched by the NCC in 2013 to migrate.
The MNP scheme allows subscribers to port from one network to another in search of better service quality while retaining their original GSM number on the new network.
The NCC report seen by our correspondent showed that MTN Nigeria gained more users for its network in the first quarter of the year with 2,798 subscribers migrating to the network from others. The network, however, lost 585 users to competitors in the period under review.
In the same vein, another industry leader, Airtel, which lost 550 dissatisfied subscribers to other networks, welcomed 1,139 new customers into its fold.
However, the same situation can not be said of the industry’s laggards, Globacom and T2 (formerly 9Mobile), who both lost more subscribers to competitors than the numbers they gained.
For instance, Glo lost 1,068 subscribers to competitors, but was only able to gain 552 users. In the same vein, T2 picked up only 49 new users from competitors under the Mobile Number Portability scheme, but lost 2,367 in a massive exodus.
In the Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) segment, operator, Vitel, welcomed 32 subscribers into its network without losing any.
While Globacom is currently bleeding from continued loss of customers and its attendant revenue loss, BH findings revealed that the company’s woes began a long time ago.
Past Glory
Based on available records, Glo at its peak of glory in mid-2023, had 62.2 million subscribers, making it the second largest network operator in Nigeria back then. By December 2024, the firm’s subscription base had crashed to below 19 million.
According to NCC’s Q1’2026 performance report, Nigeria’s active telephone subscriptions stood at 185,718,018 (185.7 million) at the end of March 2026.
Analysis of the NCC data shows that MTN leads with 95,759,210 subscribers, followed by Airtel, which has 63,629,101 subscribers, Glo with 22,639,893 subscribers and T2 in the last position with 3,478,544 users.
Proportionally, MTN Nigeria controls more than half of Nigeria’s mobile telephone market with 51.62 percent share, according to the NCC. It is closely followed by Airtel with 34.30 percent, Globacom 12.20 percent and T2 1.88 percent.
Further breakdown of the NCC data shows that Airtel and MTN were the biggest gainers of new subscribers in Q1’2026, with Airtel gaining 1,587,229 users, while MTN followed closely on its heels with 1,512,990 new subscribers.
Surprisingly, T2 performed better than expected by beating Globacom in the race for third place. T2, official data showed, added 222,460 subscribers to its subscription base, while Glo had only 180,354 new users in Q1’2026.
Globacom’s dramatic change in fortune from a once flourishing firm that once competed with MTN for market dominance with over 62 million active users tells the story of a company in decline.
According to BH’s findings, Glo’s troubles can be traced to a combination of technical and managerial challenges.
Sources of Trouble
Industry insiders, who spoke to this newspaper on the declining fortunes of Nigeria’s indigenous telecommunications firm, blamed it on both structural and regulatory challenges, including excessive executive centralization that has slowed decision-making and weakened operational efficiency in the firm, inadequate investment in network expansion and modernization, delays in responding to changing market realities, as well as the enforcement of the SIM-NIN linkage policy by the Federal Government.
The telco’s massive subscriber loss, BH’s findings revealed, began following the NCC’s enforcement of the SIM-NIN linkage policy, which aimed to sanitize the nation’s mobile subscriber database.
At the end of the Federal Government’s ‘No NIN, no SIM’ exercise, Glo lost millions of unregistered SIMs that failed to meet the new compliance standards. By September 2024, Globacom’s user base had dropped to a little over 19 million—a loss of over 42 million users, the largest decline among all operators.
While the enforcement of the SIM-NIN linkage policy dealt a massive blow to Glo’s customer base and continued profitability, it tells only part of a much deeper story.
According to available data, Glo has consistently under invested in its network infrastructure compared to its competitors.
For instance, the indigenous telecommunications firm had laid only 13,800 kilometers of fibre optic lines since inception, compared to MTN’s 31,972 kilometres and Airtel Nigeria’s 16,112 kilometres.
This deficit, industry watchers argued, had exposed Glo vulnerable to sector-wide challenges, such as fibre cuts, vandalism and unreliable power supply.
Another factor that has held down the firm from reaching projected heights is its management’s decision to operate its 8,550 telecom towers in-house.
BH findings revealed that since inception, Glo had been operating its own towers and base stations, unlike its competitors, who outsourced their tower infrastructure to specialized firms with the capacity for better maintenances and regular upgrades.
This decision to operate its towers in-house, combined with aging infrastructure and slower response times, has severely limited its ability to deliver consistent quality and coverage.
Many Glo subscribers, who spoke to BH.on the matter, said the company had largely disappointed its customers by not living up to expectations.
“It was not like this at the beginning. Glo gave its forerunners, Airtel and MTN, a run for their money when it gave us options by introducing newer technology and affordable products and services
“However, while it’s peers responded to its challenges by opening up their companies to new investors and innovations that have helped to drive their growth, Globacom under the leadership of Mike Adenuga went to sleep.
“Even Airtel that once had multiple ownership crisis successfully came out of its travails to position itself as one of the best telecommunication companies on the continent.
“It is very frustrating when you can’t make calls or get internet services on the telco’s network, which are mostly often. I stay in Abeokuta, Ogun State and I can tell you that only a few areas have good Glo signals. As a result, I decided to get Airtel and MTN lines as backup.
Leadership Challenges
“Though these networks also have their own downtimes, especially in the last 2 to 3 months, they still have better services and reach than Glo”, said Tomisin Adewale, a Glo user.
Another factor hindering the gradual and systemic decline of Globacom is its governance structure. Several sources in the telecoms industry informed BH that Globacom’s founder, Chief Mike Adenuga, has refused to allow the company to breathe.
“The company remains tightly controlled by Adenuga, with little separation between ownership and management. This centralized structure has hindered innovation and made it difficult to attract top-tier leadership.
“Many past and present employees have complained about Adenuga not giving them the required space to work or express themselves. I have heard of instances where he (Adenuga) take away middle level and top managers away from their jobs by ordering them to his Lagos and Abuja homes just to get instructions from him.
“Some claimed to have waited several hours, even days, waiting endlessly to see the chairman. At the end, what he normally tells them is what he could have passed to them through phone calls and emails.
“To worsen the matter, you can’t take a worthwhile decision in the company, no matter your rank or position, without Adenuga’s consent or approval, which seldom comes.
“So, it is not surprising to some of us that Globacom is going through its present predicament. Unless Adenuga substantially hands off the firm or give the company’s top managers more room to operate, the company will continue to lose competent hands and play second fiddle to its peers”, said an industry watcher who did not want his identity in print.
It would be recalled that Ahmad Farroukh, appointed Globacom’s CEO in May 2025 to manage the firm, hurriedly left the plum job just a month after assuming office as a result of disagreements over management autonomy.
These factors, industry analysts argued, have made it difficult for Globacom to compete effectively in an industry, where service quality and customer experience increasingly determine subscriber loyalty.
According to Toye Johnson, a telecoms expert based in Lagos, the future competitiveness of Nigeria’s second-largest indigenous telecom operator is seriously in doubt if its ‘control freak’ owner continued to toe this ‘unproductive path’.
“While Glo remains a formidable player with extensive infrastructure and strong brand presence, it is currently bleeding and losing ground to rivals, who continue to strengthen their market positions through aggressive investments in network expansion, data services and customer retention initiatives.
“The company will continue to drift if urgent steps are not taken to improve network performance, strengthen customer engagement and restore confidence among subscribers and staffers dissatisfied with the way the company is being run”, Johnson warned.