Case Study: Zain achieves operational excellence and reduced OPEX with Ericsson

Zain, formerly the Mobile Telecommunications Company (MTC), is set for growth in Africa with an Operational Excellence program

Zain, the African mobile operator formerly known as Celtel and part of the MTC Group, wanted to scale its operations across 14 countries while reducing costs and improving consistency. Ericsson supported the company with an Operational Excellence program designed to standardize best-practice processes, align organization structures, and build staff competence across the group’s network operations.

Ericsson co-developed a vendor-independent Operating Guidelines framework with Zain, combining internal best practices with eTOM standards and Ericsson’s telecom operations expertise, supported by consulting and learning services. The program included process, tools, organization, and competence-gap analyses to drive a phased improvement plan, with the expected result of lower OPEX, stronger operational efficiency, better knowledge sharing, and more customer-oriented service delivery.

Zain

Raul Pagel

Group Engineering and Planning Director