Report Buyer, the online destination for business intelligence for major industry sectors, has added a new report which examines the factors affecting the world’s most rapidly growing mobile and fixed telephony markets, Africa.
2007 Africa – Telecoms, Mobile and Broadband Overview finds that Africa’s telecoms future looks very promising and offers great opportunities to service providers, equipment vendors and investors.
Last week saw the signing of a power sharing agreement between the two major political parties in Kenya. This signalled the end of violence between ethnic groups in the country over allegations of vote rigging during presidential elections at the end of last year.
Industry analysts say that investor confidence was dented during the time of political unrest. The IPO of the country’s leading mobile operator, Safaricom, was delayed, construction on various telecoms projects didn’t take off, and other investments were held back as well. They also point out that, typically it always takes longer to restore investor confidence than it takes to destroy it, but historically and overall, Africa’s telecommunications markets have proved remarkably resilient.
The study says that Africa still has some of the world’s lowest penetration rates. So, foreign investors are scrambling for positions in this very lucrative market as privatisation and liberalisation are progressively being introduced. Explosive growth in the mobile sector has meant that by early 2007 mobile users constituted almost 90% of all African telephone subscribers. Other wireless solutions are also used to serve as substitutes for inadequate fixed-line infrastructure. A surge in demand for Internet access and broadband capabilities is expected to drive these developments further in the coming years.
Additionally, authors say that Africa’s data traffic is on the rise, fuelled by the rapid growth of ADSL and wireless broadband services. Massive efforts are under way to adapt the continent’s underdeveloped infrastructure to the growing need, both nationally and internationally.
2007 Africa – Telecoms, Mobile and Broadband Overview
Report Buyer product ID: BUD00193
Report Buyer category: Telecoms
