NAIROB – Revenue from mobile data services in Kenya will account for almost a half of telecommunications revenue by 2016 as more Kenyans embrace mobile money and mobile internet, a new telecoms study released today reveals.
The study by global research company Pyramid Research found that competition will continue to drive the cost of mobile telephone services downwards benefiting consumers while mobile voice services will bring lesser revenue. “The healthiest growth is in mobile data due to the adoption of mobile money transfer services and the penetration of 3G-based services,” noted the study titled Price Wars and Operator Competition Drive Mobile Revenue Growth as LTE Looms.
“We expect that mobile data revenue will increase from an estimated 457 million U.S. dollars in 2011 to 751 million dollars in 2016, almost a 44 per cent share of total telecom revenue,” said the study by Ronda Zelezny-Green, Associate Research Analyst and Kerem Arsal, Senior Analyst at Pyramid Research. The study notes that a recovering economy, an active commissioning body and heightened competition driven by Airtel have made the telecom sector in Kenya a dynamic environment poised for steady growth.
Statistics indicate that the Kenya telecoms market generated an expected 1.5 billion dollars in 2011 and is expected to continue this positive trend during the forecast with an expected market value of 1.7 billion dollars by 2016. The study said the current growth in the market is led by increasing revenues in the mobile sector led by revenue from mobile voice, which will however be rivalled by mobile data by 2016.
Kenya’s mobile voice revenue was estimated at 886 million dollars in 2011, which would represent 60 per cent of the total market revenue but could drop around 48 per cent share of total revenue by 2016.
“Mobile voice will lose revenue share to mobile data and broadband Internet as voice tariffs experience further reductions during the price wars and as the Kenyan infrastructure improves especially with the expected activation of undersea cables in 2012,” noted the study. “Consequently, we estimate that mobile voice revenue will decline to a projected revenue share of 48 per cent in 2016.”
The research company forecasts that new regulatory fee pricing structure will be in place starting in July 2012, saving operators from 25 per cent to75 per cent on existing costs, benefits they are expected to share with consumers. It also forecasts that the fixed and mobile revenue split will remain the same in 2011and 2016, with fixed services earning 8 per cent of all revenue and mobile earning a massive 92 per cent.
Another forecast is that the government will keep good its September 2011 promise to deploy 4G technology through use of public-private-partnership agreements. Kenya had 26.4 million mobile phone subscribers by September 30 last year up from 25.3 million recorded at the end of June 2011, representing an increase of 4.8, according to statistics released by the Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) recently.
An increase of 124.3 per cent was recorded in the number of SMS per subscriber per month from 8.5 SMS during the previous quarter to 18.99 SMS in the quarter ending September 30 2011. The total number of Internet subscriptions rose to 5.42 million during the period under review up from 4.25 million recorded in the period ending June 2011. (Xinhua)
