Following Kenya’s telecoms regulator’s decision to slash mobile interconnection charges in August after Zain, the second largest mobile operator owned by India’s Bharti Airtel, cut its tariffs in half, several operators have embarked on a price war, including Kenya’s biggest operator, Safaricom, Yu and Telkom Kenya, controlled by France Telecom’s Orange.
According to Ghossein, the operators now hope for broadband and other data services to compensate for lower mobile revenues. Communications Ministry Permanent Secretary Bitange Ndemo said that prices should only have dropped when the operators could entirely rely on earnings from broadband services.
Telkom Kenya currently has 1,2 million subscribers, while Safaricom, the dominant player, covers 80% of the market. The operator plans to roll out a fibre-cable network throughout Kenya, currently put on hold due to acts of vandalism, a 3G mobile network to compete with Safaricom and a mobile money transfer service.
