The Ethio Telecom delegation at the meeting with the Chinese company.

Ethiopia's state-owned telecoms company, Ethio Telecom, is looking into forming a digital infrastructure partnership with China's Shandong Hi-Speed Qianfang International Technology, Ogranak Beograd.

The partnership with the Chinese firm will see the company build a hyperscale data centre in Ethiopia.

Ethio Telecom explained its objective is to develop the country's digital infrastructure and fulfil the growing need for data storage and processing capacity.

“The proposed partnership involves the construction of a large-scale data centre that will provide secure, reliable and high-capacity data storage services to local and international clients,."

The facility, according to Ethio Telecom, is expected to cater to the increasing data needs of various sectors, including finance, healthcare and e-commerce, thereby contributing to Ethiopia's digital transformation.

The move comes after a recent announcement by Ethio Telecom, stating it is increasing its efforts to strengthen the capacity and coverage of the telecoms and digital infrastructure through a series of network improvement projects to assure service quality.

In the current reporting period, the company’s 4G mobile network was expanded to 966 sites, while the 3G network was expanded to 682 locations.

As a result, the telco said 4G network service had been extended to an additional 124 cities and districts, increasing the total number of accessible 4G cities from 300 to 424.

Also, during the year, the number of 5G stations was increased to 189 through the expansion of the 5G network to 79 stations.

Additionally, 5G service is now available in four regional capitals, with implementation work under way to make four more cities 5G-ready, said the company.