Kigali — Millicom International Cellular S.A has emerged the preferred bidder for Rwanda's third national telecoms licence against Telecel Globe Ltd, Zain Mauritius Ltd and Larrycom-Expresso.

The deal has been approved by Rwanda's cabinet after evaluating the technical and financial results of the bids.

The cabinet announced that Millicom was preferred because of its highest technical score (83.49%) and best financial offer (US$60,007,000) against Telecel Globe which is the first reserved bidder with 75.87% third technical score and second highest US$55.5million financial offer.

Zain Mauritius Ltd (formerly Celtel) emerged the second reserved bidder with the second technical score (80.7%) and the lowest financial offer (US$45million).

Larrycom-Expresso's financial offer was not opened due to its lowest technical score which was below the required 70%.

Millicom International Cellular S.A is a global telecommunications group with mobile telephony operations in 16 countries in Asia, Latin America and Africa. The group's mobile operations have a combined population under licence of approximately 291 million people.

Telecel Globe Ltd is an Egyptian company established by Orascom.

The Zain group boasts of over 50million subscribers and a market capitalization of over US$25.8billion. Zain has sound operations in Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Democratic Republic of Congo, neighbours of Rwanda.

Larrycom-Expresso for Investment is a privately owned Sudanese company with offshore offices in Dubai, Beirut and Egypt.

After approval by the Rwanda cabinet, Millicom announced the success on its website.

It announced that it will hold 87.5% of equity in a newly created joint venture company in partnership with Marathon Corporation, an established local company with numerous business interests in Rwanda. The joint venture will pay US$60million for the 15 year licence.

"We are very pleased to have been awarded the third mobile licence in Rwanda. It is a country with great potential for mobile telephony as it is a very densely populated country with an extremely low mobile penetration which will enable us to build out a network quickly", president and CEO, Millicom Cellular, Marc Beuls said in a press release posted on the website.

"Economically, its (Rwanda) strategic position between our operations in Tanzania and DRC offers potential operational synergies. Rwanda will become Millicom's eighth country in Africa and will strengthen our overall position in the continent, which we believe will be the fastest growing part of Millicom's business in the coming years,"said the release.

However, for Millicom to finally sign the 15 year licence, it will have to fulfill terms and conditions of the licence as applied to the existing two licences in the country, namely MTN Rwanda and Rwandate.

Col. Diogène Mundenge, director general of Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Agency told media in Kigali the government was now going to commence negotiations on the licence with Millicom.

Should negotiations fail, the first reserved bidder (Telecel Globe) will follow and Zain will be the last chance if the first two fail. This would however require Zain to increase its financial offer to a minimum of US$50million.

The winner should be ready to sign the 15-year duopoly licence by the end of the year (December).

Rwanda has 10million people but only between 1million and 1.2 million people use mobile communications services provided by MTN Rwanda and Rwandatel. On estimate, this is about 11% of the entire population in which MTN Rwanda leads the market with 1million mobile phone users.

It is hoped with a third licence, telephony penetration in Rwanda will rise to 50% in two years from the current 11% by introducing much needed competition to the sector.

RURA boss, Mundenge believes the three operators should have connected at least 2 million people each, to bring mobile access to six million Rwandans by 2012.