Morocco-US private operator gets license to exploit satellite telecommunication networks

"Orbcomm Maghreb" is the first private operator in Morocco to obtain a license for the setting and the exploitation of a public telecommunication network via satellite, with an investment of more than $9 million over 10 years.

The Morocco-US joint venture will market its services starting next January through a network of retail selling offices.

Orbcomm Maghreb, which will install in Morocco a ground monitoring station for all the region, the first in Africa, will thus become the third telecom operator in Morocco, after the state-owned Maroc-Telecom and Medi-telecom, a Spanish-Portuguese-Moroccan consortium which won for $1.1 billion a bid to operate the second mobile phone license.

Thanks to this ground station, Morocco, one of the few south Mediterranean countries that liberalized its telecoms sector, will become a platform servicing Europe, North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa. It is useful for various economic operators to access latest information technologies and other professionals wishing to communicate with their fleet and to locate their vans. The state can also place Orbcomm devices to measure water pollution or forecast natural catastrophes.