Millicom Group has announced plans to modernise its recent acquisition Zanzibar Telecom (Zantel).

Cynthia Gordon, CEO of Millicom Group's Africa division said the exercise would include improvement on voice, data and the network in order to ensure enhanced capacity and improve quality of service.

Gordon was speaking after Zantel's first board meeting since Millicom acquired 85% of Zantel shares from Etisalat.

"Millicom will be supporting significant growth and expansion of the company's operations in the country aimed to help Zantel lead the market in Zanzibar with the most innovative services, and of course increase its coverage and improve connectivity," said Gordon.

Millicom has also expressed its desire to strengthen the partnership it has with the government of Zanzibar, which retains a 15% in Zantel.

"As a leading telecom operator in Zanzibar, we can't emphasise enough how important our partnership with the Zanzibar government is, and through that our commitment to the people of Zanzibar."

Rachel Samrén, executive vice president, external affairs at Millicom and chairperson of Zantel's new board of directors elaborated on the improvement plans. "It is because of this that Millicom will ensure the Zanzibari community is empowered through various corporate social responsibility projects."

Benoit Janin, CEO of Zantel spoke about the plan to launch the first ever 4G LTE network in Zanzibar. 'Zantel is going to leverage Millicom's culture of excellence and performance bringing a new era for Zantel where we are going to re-energise the current brand and increase the quality of service, improve mobile money services and expand areas of support for the community."

Janin also noted that all the employees he had met in Zanzibar had confidence in moving together towards achieving the telecom company's goals.

Zantel plans to launch new offers for customers in 2016, including national roaming, extended 3G services and 4G, as well as improved mobile financial services.