Orange Liberia is set to provide a boost for rural communities in the country after striking a deal with US-based Vanu to deploy at least 200 telecommunications towers.

These towers will provide mobile services including 2G through to 4G and will be deployed over the next two years.

Founded in 1998, Vanu specializes in providing assistance to operators in reaching off-grid markets via turnkey mobile communications solutions.

This announcement comes after Orange signed an agreement with Vanu last November, as part of a network-as-a-service (NaaS) deal that will see Vanu also deliver technology upgrades for the mobile operator.

For Orange, this latest deal is part of its ‘IDEAL’ program, which is aimed at extending network coverage to 20 million people living in rural areas of Africa through the construction of 5,000 sites in four years, with a keen focus on Liberia, Burkina Faso, and Cote d’Ivoire.

Prior to this agreement, Vanu worked with other operators including BSNL in India, where it was awarded a contract for 1,000 off-grid sites.

In another rural Africa telecoms push, Africa Mobile Networks secured a $20 million loan last week to expand the rollout of telecom services to rural and ultra-rural Africa, following backing from two investors, BlueOrchard Sustainable Assets Fund (BOSAF) and the OP Finnfund Global Impact Fund I.