ICT and Telecommunications Industry in Ghana 2024

This report focuses on the information and communication technology sector (ICT) in Ghana which includes telephony, the internet and broadband, and the infrastructure that supports it. The report includes information on the mobile market, base stations and towers, wired and fixed telephony and mobile money. It includes notable players, corporate actions and recent investments and developments.

There are profiles of 17 companies including major operators MTN, Vodafone and AT Ghana, cable companies such as MainOne, and infrastructure and tower companies such as ATC Ghana and Helios.

Introduction

• Ghana’s telecoms infrastructure is more developed than most of its regional peers, and the industry is characterised by significant competition.
• The industry is dominated by three mobile operators that include MTN Ghana.
• The high level of merger and acquisition activity in the country is evident in deals involving the other two major players - Vodafone Ghana was bought by African company Telecel Group in 2023 and is changing its brand to Telecel, and government-owned AT Ghana is involved in a deal with UK-based Hannam Investments.
• Growth is driven by new affordable products and services, increased demand for data services, rising adoption of smartphones, increasing population and favourable government policies.
• Despite the industry’s growth, increasing cost pressures driven by high inflation and foreign exchange fluctuations remain a challenge for operators.

Market Trends

• Competition is highly consolidated.
• Growth is driven by increasing population, expanding communication services, and rising adoption of smartphones.
• Increasing connection to underserviced areas.
• Key strategies are the introduction of new and affordable products and services, mergers and acquisitions, and expansion of services, network and bandwidth.
• Most growth is attained by premium connectivity and data services.
• Reducing 2G and 3G connectivity and increasing availability of 4G connections.

Opportunities

• A potential large market for value added services.
• Cloud infrastructure showing potential growth.
• Fintech, healthtech and edutech opportunities.
• Growing demand for data services.
• Mobile money interoperability system across networks, expected to boost mobile money usage.
• Rural network investments to boost network coverage.

Challenges

• A wide gap in access to digital services.
• Foreign exchange fluctuations.
• High cost of electricity, fuel and utilities.
• High data costs.
• High inflation effects on consumer demand.
• Increase in competition.
• The inability of local operators to meet inputs costs.
• Vandalism of telecom equipment such as fibre cables.

Market Outlook

• Ghana’s economy is returning to stability.
• High inflation and interest rates are expected to keep private consumption and investment low.
• Most telecom operators will continue with cost controls, investment in infrastructure to expand networks and product innovation.
• Other measures are improving liquidity, and strengthening balance sheets.
• The high mobile penetration will continue to grow, driven by the affordability of mobile handsets and data services and availability of mobile broadband networks.
• Demand for data services will increase, driven by growing usage of social media, mobile gaming, video streaming and mobile financial services, putting pressure on telecom operators to continue investing in network upgrades and capacity expansion.
• Mobile money transactions are expected to grow strongly.