By Omolara Beyioku

 Lagos. November 4, 2008. The Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) has granted approval to Nokia, Siemens, Sony Ericsson, LG, Motorola, Supermaster, Samsung, Soutec, Huawei among other major big equipment suppliers to market some of their handsets in Nigeria.

The telecoms regulator announced that Iskratel, Huawei Tech, Harris Communications, Stratex Networks and some other companies are manufacturers who were granted type approval for their equipment.

In all, a total of 48 manufacturers got the approval in the handset category and several manufacturers were in the equipment category.

Type approvals were granted for CDMA equipment, Broadband Wireless Access Point, Digital Microwave Radio, Lucent Switch, Switches, Wireless, PDH Microwave Radio, IC-Chip Wireless Public Payphone among others.

 Nokia took the lead in the handset category with 103 of its handsets cleared for the Nigerian market followed by Sony Ericsson with 54 handsets.

The first five approved manufacturers with the highest number of phones are: Nokia, 103 handset; Sony Ericsson, 54 handsets; Motorola, 48 handsets; Samsung, 39 handsets and ZTE with 15 handsets.

It is noteworthy that there is no Nigerian company among the equipment manufacturers who are mostly from China, U.S.A., Germany, Japan, among others.

Analysis of the type approval list reveals that some of the manufacturers are responsible for the direct sales and supply of their equipment while some of them have partners in Nigeria that handle the supply and sales.

Also, some companies that serve as partners to manufacturers that do not have physical presence in Nigeria include; Betel Associates Telecoms Consultant which partners Comba Telecoms Limited of China; BCN Nigeria Ltd that partners Wuhan Research Institute of Post and Telecoms China and Microwaves Networks International Eqp.

The Table below Shows the Names of the Handset Make and the Number of Approved Model:

World Phone                                 1

ZTE                                                 16

_{Source: Technology Times Intelligence Unit/NCC}