Africa wrap: Vodacom to expand in rural Tanzania
TechCentral wraps up the major technology news from around the African continent. Compiled by Craig Wilson.
Tanzania is Vodacom’s second biggest market after SA, but the company’s Tanzania CEO, Rene Meza, says that although mobile penetration in urban areas is more than 80%, in rural areas it’s only 25%. He says this means the company must look to rural areas for growth and operators must ensure there is infrastructure there to support it. He says the company will invest 120bn shillings (almost R640m) in network expansion in the coming year. Source: Daily News
Rwanda unlikely to hit mobile target
Despite an increase in subscriber numbers of 3% last month, bringing total penetration to 44,4%, the central African nation of Rwanda is unlikely to reach the government target of 60% penetration by the end of the year. The largest operator in the market is MTN Rwanda, which has just over 3m of the country’s 4,8m subscribers. Tigo, the Millicom International Cellular SA-owned operator, accounts for 1,6m subscribers, while newcomer Airtel, which began operations in May, has 110 000 subscribers. Source: New Times
3G take-up in Nigeria slow
Four years since licences for radio frequency spectrum to provide third-generation mobile data services were issued to Nigerian operators, the country only has 6m 3G subscribers, or 6,4% of the country’s total mobile subscriber base. Both industry players and government claim that operators have failed to utilise spectrum allocated to them efficiently and that, despite clamouring for more spectrum, they are doing little do drive uptake of 3G services or provide them in rural areas. Source: Business Day
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