Skip to Content »

Wireless Federation » archive for 'Tanzania'

Zain Tanzania targets a subscriber base of 3.8 million by year end (Tanzania)

  • October 7th, 2008
  • 12:00 pm

Zain Tanzania targets to grow it’s subscriber base by 15%, raising the total to 3.8 million by the end of 2008. Khaled Muhtadi, MD Zain Tanzania said that the celco has spent nearly USD440 million on its network in last four years and plans to invest more than USD180 million on it next year. ‘We have reached over 3.3 million customers today and our target is to exceed 3.8 million by the end of the year,’ he said. The challenges that Zain Tanzania faces are the falling subscriber revenues, high cost of handsets and the slow movement of equipment and supplies through the port and customs.

   

Vodacom claims of 34.6million subscribers (South Africa)

  • July 22nd, 2008
  • 1:29 pm

Vodacom has reported a 6.6% increase in subscriber numbers in the twelve months to the end of June, with the operator claiming 34.6 million customers in South Africa, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lesotho and Mozambique. The company says revenues for the quarter were up 14.5% year-on-year. Vodacom is owned by Telkom South Africa and Vodafone, though the UK group is looking to increase its stake.

   

Vodacom network spend tops USD2 billion (Tanzania)

  • June 9th, 2008
  • 2:54 pm

Vodacom Tanzania says that to date, it has invested around USD2 billion in the country to expand its networks and services and will continue to invest there to reach more people – particularly those living in rural parts of Tanzania. Dar es Salaam-based newspaper The Citizen quotes Vodacom managing director Dietlof Mare as saying that the cellco is determined to expand its network in order to serve more people, and is keen to connect as many as possible to its 3G/3.5G networks.

   

 

 

Vodacom rolls out 3G to Arusha

  • June 4th, 2008
  • 2:37 pm

Vodacom Tanzania yesterday launched 3G services in the northern city of Arusha, offering subscribers access to high speed internet connectivity. In February 2007 Vodacom Tanzania launched 3.5G services in the capital Dar es Salaam, offering broadband speed on the move via an HSDPA data card. The service has since been rolled out in Dodoma, the third biggest city in the country and capital of the Dodoma region.

In February 2006 the Tanzanian cellco’s parent company Vodacom Group revealed plans to launch a 3.5G network in Tanzania before the end of the year, but the rollout took longer than expected and it was not until September that year that Siemens won a supply contract for the new network. In November 2006 Vodacom Tanzania updated its rollout programme, saying it would now begin deploying a 3.5G network from the start of 2007. At the time the company’s Chief Operating Officer Pieter Uys said the cellco was experiencing increased demand for data services from its existing customer base, and had seen revenue from data-based services rising by 30% in 2006, to ZAR65 million (USD9.1 million).

   

Etisalat’s Zantel unit looking to capture 35% market share within three years

  • May 22nd, 2008
  • 2:50 pm

Zanzibar Telecom (Zantel), a 51%-owned subsidiary of Emirates Telecommunications Corp (Etisalat), hopes to capture as much as 35% of the domestic mobile market by 2011 on the back of rising economic growth in the country, reports Reuters citing a company spokesman as saying. According to Zantel’s Chief Financial Officer Arthur Hudson, the group currently has roughly 10% of the market, equivalent to around a million users, but hopes to increase this to reach 30% to 35% of the market in the next two to three years. ‘There is huge growth potential in Tanzania with only 20% market penetration,’ he said. Hudson went on to say that the operator, currently the smallest Tanzanian cellco by subscribers behind Vodacom, Celtel and MIC Tanzania (Tigo), is halfway to completing a USD100 million network upgrade designed to provide access to 2.2 million customers by 2009. In phase two of the expansion project, Zantel’s CFO said the company would spend a similar amount again to boost network capacity to five million users.

By the end of March 2008 Vodacom was the largest mobile operator in Tanzania with an estimated four million customers, up from 3.87 million at the start of the year, followed by Celtel Tanzania with 2.59 million, Tigo (1.45 million) and Zantel, with a million. More than nine of out ten Tanzanians are now reported to have access to a mobile phone, even if not one of their own, by using public wireless payphone alternatives such as Vodacom’s People’s Phone service.

   

 
 

Celtel extends One Network to six additional countries

  • November 26th, 2007
  • 3:29 pm

Mobile operator Celtel International, part of the Zain group, has extended its ‘One Network’, the borderless mobile network in Africa, to an additional six countries. These are Burkina Faso, Chad, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria and Sudan. These countries now join the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda in the network which was initially launched in September 2006. All Celtel’s customers both prepaid and postpaid in the twelve countries from East, Central and West Africa, can move freely across geographic borders making calls and sms at local rates. They can top-up their prepaid phones with locally-bought airtime cards. The One Network service is automatically activated upon crossing into any one of the other countries, with no prior registration required or sign up fee charged.

   

Vodacom net profit grows 17.5%, 31.6 million customers (South Africa)

  • November 21st, 2007
  • 2:43 pm

African mobile operator Vodacom reported H1 revenues of ZAR 22.8 billion, up 17.2 percent from the year-ago period. Its net profit rose 17.5 percent to ZAR 3.7 billion versus the year-earlier period. Its EBITDA increased by 15.5 percent to ZAR 7.6 million versus a year-earlier. The total customers in South Africa increased by 15.3 percent to 23.3 million. The number of prepaid customers rose 13.5 percent to 19.8 million, while the number of contract customers increased by 27.4 percent to 3.4 million. Vodacom maintained a very low contract churn of 8.3 percent as compared to 11.0 percent in the same period of last year. Total customers including non-south African operations increased by 22.6 percent to 31.6 million.

Vodacom Tanzania’s estimated market share decreased slightly to 54 percent (30 September 2006: 55 percent). The customer base increased by 41.8 percent to 3.7 million whilst gross connections increased by 36.6 percent to 1.2 million on 30 September of this year. Vodacom Congo remained the market leader with an estimated market share of 44 percent under challenging circumstances. The growth achieved in the customer base of 56.8 percent to 3.2 million is a direct result of increased coverage in strategic areas and the implementation of an improved sales and distribution strategy. Vodacom Lesotho is well positioned to counter any competitive activity and has retained its market share of 80 percent as at 30 September of this year. The customer base of grew by 39.5 percent to 332,000. Although Vodacom’s estimated market share has grown to 38 percent compared with 33 percent on 30 September 2006 on the back of strong growth in the customer base of 55.5 percent to 1.1 million, ARPUs remained low and the annualised churn was high at 57.3 percent.

   

Redline to provide WiMAX network in Tanzania (Tanzania)

  • November 15th, 2007
  • 1:48 pm

Tanzania-based telecommunications provider Hotspot Business Solutions has selected Redline’s RedMAX products for the country’s first national WiMAX network. The equipment provider said Hotspot will be able to deliver high-quality voice, video and data internet services across Tanzania, with its six-city WiMAX network. Under the terms of the deal, the Hotspot WiMAX network will be closely managed and coordinated by RapidCloud Technology. Hotspot said it will launch the first phase of its WiMAX network on 15 November, delivering commercial WiMAX services to Dar es Salaam, the country’s premier commercial centre, and Mwanza. The first phase will also include the deployment of a RedMAX network in Arusha in December 2007. Hotspot expects to increase the number of its subscribers in these regions by up to 60 percent over the next two years. The second phase of the Hotspot RedMAX deployment will begin in January 2008, and will bring WiMAX services to the capital city of Dodoma, as well as Morogoro and Zanzibar.

   

Kenya to start national fibre network project in early 2008 (Kenya)

  • October 15th, 2007
  • 2:58 pm

The construction of Kenya’s national fibre-optic network is expected to start early next year. Information Permanent Secretary Bitange Ndemo said the network had received approval from the Treasury and its roll-out will take six months. Arrangements have been finalised with the three companies which were awarded the tenders. These include Huawei, ZTE and Sagem. The companies are currently doing a survey to determine the route the cable will follow and also determine how long it will take to link the respective towns they are supposed to cover. The network has been split in three sections, namely Western Kenya, Coast and North Eastern region, and Central region, which will be handled by each of the three companies. Sagem is expected to handle the Coast and Northern part of the country, Huawei will handle Nairobi and the central area, and ZTE will handle Western Kenya, which runs from the Tanzania boarder post of Namanga to Lokichoggio.

   

Kenya: Goodbye Celtel? (Kenya)

  • September 13th, 2007
  • 3:18 pm

Celtel International is considering a major re-branding strategy that would see it drop the ‘Celtel’ brand and adopt a completely new identity - Zain. The plan is expected to create unique difficulties in Kenya and Nigeria, where the Celtel brand is still quite new, as well as across all non-Arab operations. It is part of a long-term strategy by Kuwait’s MTC Group, which owns the mobile telephone operator, to re-invent itself through the launch of a global brand.

MTC, which has expanded significantly through acquisitions, is seeking to consolidate recent growth under one banner. “We have a new brand that will be launched as single global brand for all our operations,” Dr Saad Al-Barrak, MTC’s deputy chairman and chief executive officer, said recently. “We will start any new operation with this new global brand.”

Controversy

Controversy has already erupted over the brand name chosen. Critics feel Zain, leaked in Kuwait in early August, has limited appeal to cultures outside the Arab world. A recent valuation of MTC by analysts from investment banker Morgan Stanley found that Africa accounted for 70 per cent of the company’s fair value.

MTC Chairman, Mr Asa’ad Al Banwan , Celtel International Chairman, Mr Mo Ibrahim, and MTC Deputy Chairman & Managing Director, Dr Saad Al-Barrak. Photo by MTC

The new logo has also been described as too dark and moody. The re-branding process has reportedly begun in Kuwait and is expected to spread to other MTC-branded operations in the Middle East.

Change will come to Africa and its Celtel-branded operations from 2008. The new changes come shortly after a regional marketing blitz to announce the expansion of Celtel’s borderless mobile network to include the Republic of Congo, Gabon and Democratic Republic of Congo. The service was previously limited to Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. The decision to re-brand will create a costly marketing and logistical challenge for the Kenya and Nigeria operations, given that the two only recently re-branded to Celtel from KenCell and V-Mobile respectively.

The change from KenCell, which began in 2004, is yet to be completed by Celtel Kenya: Many of their telephone booths - admittedly an atrophied part of the business - are still branded KenCell. Nigeria’s switch from VMobile, which began last year, will also have to be scrapped.

A huge task

Speaking to FS during the Second Annual Connecting Rural Communities Africa Forum in Nairobi, Mr Mwaghazi Mwachofi, Celtel International Vice-President for Regulatory Affairs, confirmed that discussions on rebranding were in progress. “Nothing has been decided as yet, nothing concrete,” Mwachofi said when pressed on the matter.

“The Celtel brand is strong and powerful and re-branding is huge task.” MTC Kuwait is also expected to form a new subsidiary, MTC International, as a private company to hold all the MTC Group’s foreign assets and operations.

A newspaper report on the plan several weeks ago saw the Kuwait Stock Exchange halt trading in MTC shares pending clarification of the issues raised.

A local Arabic-language daily had reported that MTC was going to form an entity with $1.73 billion (Sh116 billion) in capital as an umbrella company under which MTC Kuwait and MTC International, called Zain, would operate.

The paper had also said the international unit would sell a stake - possibly 40 per cent or more - in an initial public offering on the London Stock Exchange next year. The re-branding confirms MTC’s ambitions to become one of the biggest mobile operators in the world.

The strategy

According Al-Barrak, the company was looking for a global brand that would work from China to Gabon, in Rio-de-Janeiro and Madras, in Moscow and Iceland. Currently, MTC is looking to fill gaps in sub-Saharan Africa - for example Angola Ethiopia and Senegal - and eyeing Saudi Arabia’s third licence. The company is also making noises about moving its headquarters because of Kuwait’s investor-unfriendly laws.

“The Kuwaiti business environment repels investment and the country’s laws are not good for a financial hub,” Al-Barrak was recently quoted as saying. Kuwait has been dragging its feet on reforms to create a more transparent stock exchange.

Another Kuwaiti law imposes a 55 per cent tax on foreign investors. MTC, Kuwait’s largest publicly traded company, said last week that it could move to Dubai or Bahrain, the Gulf’s financial centres, or to Amsterdam, headquarters of its subsidiary Celtel. The firm operates in Bahrain in partnership with Britain’s Vodafone Group and acquired Netherlands-based Celtel in 2005. It has no presence in Dubai. “MTC is today thinking on the global scale… especially since Kuwait accounts for only 15 per cent of its revenue, (a figure that) will fall below seven per cent in the next two years.” Incorporated in 1983 in Kuwait, MTC now has a presence in 20 countries.

The Group is a leading mobile operator in six Middle Eastern and 14 sub-Saharan African countries providing a comprehensive range of mobile voice and data services to over 29.7 million active individual and business customers.

It operates in Kuwait and Bahrain as MTCVodafone, in Jordan as Fastlink, in Iraq as MTC-Atheer, in Lebanon as MTC-Touch and in Sudan as Mobitel. It also has 14 operations in sub-Saharan Africa as Celtel. These are Burkina Faso, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Republic of the Congo, Gabon, Kenya, Malawi, Madagascar, Niger, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. The company has also won Saudi Arabia’s third mobile license and is expected to roll-out a network soon. The change of identity is part of MTC’s plan to re-brand its operations across all networks in line with their “three by three by three (3×3x3)” strategy.