An optimization model for determining the number of telecommunication companies

Abstract

The revolution in communications that has cut across Africa, giving it the reputation as the fastest growing mobile market in the world, has transformed Uganda, its people and their way of life, economically, socially and politically. This work presents the performance of the telecommunication industry with the view of developing a model that can determine the optimal number of companies that can offer telecommunication services. A Simulation model is designed, and it incorporates the key/critical variables that influence the progress of the telecommunication sector. Emphasis is put on mobile telecommunication, which has superseded all the other telecommunication channels in the country. This model shows how when one of these key variables is changed, can affect the others. This is developed in a causal loop diagram, which is a cause - effect diagram. Stella software has been used in the development of this model, together with vensim in the development of the causal loop diagram.Graphs are presented that depict the telecommunication characteristics and performance of the industry as it progresses through time. The results show that the number of telecommunication companies that can be licensed keep on changing depending on the behavior of the affecting factors.