With the approach of inaugurating 4G services, according to remarks of the Minister of Telecommunications and Information Technology Yasser El Kady, the mobile market is seeing volatility of service quality across different companies, especially Vodafone, which 3G services saw interruptions for over six hours last week. Sources at Vodafone said that it was due to the reallocation of frequency bands in preparation for offering the 4G services. According to a report by the National Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (NTRA) for May 2017, the quality of voice calls across the three different mobile operators, Vodafone, Orange, and Etisalat, has dropped in the Greater Cairo region. Approximately 18,516 mobile calls were examined in May in the Greater Cairo area. Out of the total calls examined, 21 were dropped, while the number of blocked calls reached 44. NTRA's data showed that Orange performed the best among the three companies in terms of voice service quality. The examination placed 6,157 calls over the provider's network, only 6 of which were blocked, while 3 were dropped. The voice services of Vodafone were examined through 6,284 calls, 7 of which were blocked, while 4 calls were dropped. Etisalat Company was examined through 6,075 calls, 31 of which were blocked, and 14 of which were dropped. The number of test calls by the NTRA has recently declined from 15,852 in March to 18,516 in May. Regarding mobile internet services, the NTRA examined the service through 10,972 connection attempts (internet calls) through the networks of the three operators, of which none were blocked or dropped. The NTRA conducted 3,736 connection attempts via the Etisalat network and 3,720 via Orange, while Vodafone had 3,516 internet connection attempts, of which none were blocked or dropped.
