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Kenya - Mobile Infrastructure, Operators and Broadband - Statistics and Analyses

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    Report

  • 69 Pages
  • March 2019
  • Region: Kenya
  • Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd
  • ID: 1085938
Kenya's mobile market has continued to grow steadily, supported by a mobile subscriber base of about 47 million. Some market consolidation occurred following the acquisition by Airtel and Safaricom of Essar Telecom's yuMobile business. More significantly, in February 2019 Airtel Kenya and Telkom Kenya signed an agreement to merge their networks and operate under the Airtel-Telekom joint venture which will be 49% owned by Telekom Kenya. The merge units will provide a greater challenge to the market dominance of Safaricom.

While all network operators have invested in mobile technologies and infrastructure upgrades to support mobile data services, competition has nevertheless presented challenges to their profitability, with uneven revenue growth reported in recent years. Orange Group was the principal casualty of competition, leading it to sell its stake in Telkom Kenya. By contrast, Safaricom has seen very strong growth on the back of its popular M-PESA payment platform. This dominance encouraged the government to consider, and later dismiss, recommendations that Safaricom split off its M-PESA business from its voice and data offerings.

To encourage the development of LTE services the government has pursued an open-access approach. Disputes centered on licence fees delayed the launch of LTE services by MNOs, though they continued to invest in infrastructure and technology upgrades using trial licences.

Key Developments:

Telkom Kenya and Airtel Kenya sign merger agreement;
Another 600,000 SIM cards deactivated;
Safaricom launches M-PESA Global payment service;
Government proposes increase in m-money transfer tax;
Regulator introduces a new system to measure QoS parameters;
M-money interoperability starts;
Airtel Kenya pays $25 million for its 800MHz concession to provide LTE services;
M-Tiba mobile health payment platform launched;
One Network Area initiative expands to include mobile data and mobile money services;
Report update includes the regulator's market data to September 2018, telcos' operating and financial data to Q3 2018, recent market developments.

Companies mentioned in this report include:

Safaricom, Bharti Airtel (formerly Zain, Celtel), Essar Telkom Kenya, Huawei Technologies, ZTE, Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia Networks, Mobile Pay (Tangaza Pesa), Zioncell Kenya, Finserve Africa (Equitel)

Table of Contents

1 Overview of Kenya's mobile market
1.1 General statistics
1.2 Mobile data
1.3 Mobile broadband
1.4 Forecasts - mobile subscribers 2019; 2021; 2023
2 Regulatory issues
2.1 Roaming
2.2 Mobile Termination Rates (MTRs)
2.3 International gateways
2.4 Spectrum
2.5 Mobile Number Portability (MNP)
2.6 Network sharing
2.7 Quality of Service (QoS)
2.8 SIM card registration
2.9 Taxes
2.10 Tariff regulation
3 Mobile infrastructure
3.1 Analogue networks
3.2 Digital networks4G (LTE)
4 Major mobile operators
4.1 Mobile market share by operator
4.2 Safaricom
4.3 Airtel Kenya (formerly Zain, Celtel, KenCell)
4.4 Essar Telecom Kenya (yuMobile, formerly Econet)
4.5 Telkom Kenya
4.6 Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNOs)
5 Mobile content and applications
5.1 Mobile money transfer, m-banking
5.2 M-medicine
6 Handsets7 Related reports
List of Tables
Table 1 Mobile services revenue and investments 2009- 2017
Table 2 Mobile traffic share by operator 2014 2018
Table 3 Historic - Mobile subscribers and penetration rate in Kenya 1999 2009
Table 4 Mobile subscribers and penetration rate in Kenya 2010 2018
Table 5 Prepaid and contract mobile subscribers 2014- 2018
Table 6 SMS traffic by quarter 2012 2018
Table 7 SMS annual traffic 2008 2017
Table 8 MMS traffic 2012 2015
Table 9 Mobile internet subscribers by provider 2013 2017
Table 10 Mobile internet market share by provider 2014 2018
Table 11 Active mobile broadband subscribers 2010 2018
Table 12 Mobile data subscribers 2015 2018
Table 13 Forecast mobile subscribers 2019; 2021; 2023
Table 14 Annual mobile number portings 2013- 2018
Table 15 2G Mobile base stations by operator 2012- 2017
Table 16 3G Mobile base stations by operator 2012- 2017
Table 17 Market share of subscribers by operator 2010 2018
Table 18 Safaricom revenue 2011 2019
Table 19 Safaricom revenue by sector 2010 2019
Table 20 Safaricom - proportion of service revenue by sector 2014 2019
Table 21 Safaricom subscribers 2010 2018
Table 22 Safaricom base stations by technology 2013 2018
Table 23 Airtel Kenya subscribers 2010 2018
Table 24 Historic - Essar Telecom subscribers 2010 2014
Table 25 Telkom Kenya revenue 2010 2014
Table 26 Telkom Kenya mobile subscribers 2011 2018
Table 27 Finserve Africa mobile subscribers 2014 2018
Table 28 Mobile money penetration rate 2013 2018
Table 29 Mobile money transfer statistics 2011 2018
Table 30 Mobile money subscribers by operator 2014 2018
Table 31 Safaricom - M-PESA revenue 2008 2019
Table 32 Safaricom active M-PESA customers 2012 2018
Table 33 Safaricom M-PESA transactions value by type 2011 2018
List of Charts
Chart 1 Mobile subscribers and penetration rate in Kenya 2005 2018
Chart 2 Prepaid and contract mobile subscribers 2014- 2018
Chart 3 Active mobile broadband subscribers 2010 2018
Chart 4 Market share of subscribers by operator 2010 2018
Chart 5 Safaricom revenue 2011 2019
Chart 6 Safaricom revenue by sector 2010 2019
Chart 7 Safaricom - proportion of service revenue by sector 2014 2019
Chart 8 Safaricom M-PESA transactions value by type 2011 2018
List of Exhibits
Exhibit 1 Texting elephants
Exhibit 2 Job offers by SMS

Companies Mentioned

  • Safaricom
  • Bharti Airtel (formerly Zain, Celtel)
  • Essar Telkom Kenya
  • Huawei Technologies
  • ZTE
  • Alcatel-Lucent
  • Nokia Networks
  • Mobile Pay (Tangaza Pesa)
  • Zioncell Kenya
  • Finserve Africa (Equitel)