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NAIROBI — Safaricom, Kenya’s biggest telecommunications company, plans to begin selling bundled internet and television services for on-demand viewing within the next 12 months, CEO Bob Collymore said on Wednesday.
The offerings, which will be available on devices including tablet computers, cellphones and television sets, are aimed at tapping revenue streams beyond the company’s core voice service.
Competition in Kenya’s telecommunications market three years ago triggered a price war, causing a sharp reduction in cell phone call rates that led firms to expand into new lines of data business to lure subscribers.
"We will provide aggregation of content and delivery of content," Mr Collymore said in an interview. "Certainly within the year, we could be playing relatively prominently in that space.
"We will become a content provider to several forms of media including TV stations and YouTube. People want to decide when they want to consume, they don’t want you to tell them. That immediacy is, I think, how the future will be defined."
Sales growth from Safaricom’s cellphone money-transfer system M-Pesa, internet and text-message services has outpaced revenue from voice for at least the past three years. Still, the share of revenue from phone calls was 60% of total sales in the financial year to March versus about a third for nonvoice.
In Kenya, Wananchi, under the Zuku brand, offers high-speed internet, fixed phone-line services and cable television. Cape Town-based Naspers’ Multichoice Africa offers digital satellite-television via its DStv unit.
Safaricom is developing its own platform to handle M-Pesa transactions at a cost of 25-billion Kenyan shillings ($291.3m ) that should be completed between April and September 2015, eliminating a 10% commission it now pays Vodafone, Mr Collymore said. Vodafone owns 40% of Safaricom. The new platform will double the speed of transactions to 600 per second with the ability to scale up, he said.
Half of all cellphone money-transfer payments done globally and about 99% in Kenya are processed through M-Pesa, with an average of 550 shillings per transaction, Mr Collymore said. M-Pesa moves the equivalent of 27% of the country’s $37bn gross domestic product, he said.
Support our award-winning journalism. The Premium package (digital only) is R30 for the first month and thereafter you pay R129 p/m now ad-free for all subscribers.
Safaricom to expand internet, TV services
NAIROBI — Safaricom, Kenya’s biggest telecommunications company, plans to begin selling bundled internet and television services for on-demand viewing within the next 12 months, CEO Bob Collymore said on Wednesday.
The offerings, which will be available on devices including tablet computers, cellphones and television sets, are aimed at tapping revenue streams beyond the company’s core voice service.
Competition in Kenya’s telecommunications market three years ago triggered a price war, causing a sharp reduction in cell phone call rates that led firms to expand into new lines of data business to lure subscribers.
"We will provide aggregation of content and delivery of content," Mr Collymore said in an interview. "Certainly within the year, we could be playing relatively prominently in that space.
"We will become a content provider to several forms of media including TV stations and YouTube. People want to decide when they want to consume, they don’t want you to tell them. That immediacy is, I think, how the future will be defined."
Sales growth from Safaricom’s cellphone money-transfer system M-Pesa, internet and text-message services has outpaced revenue from voice for at least the past three years. Still, the share of revenue from phone calls was 60% of total sales in the financial year to March versus about a third for nonvoice.
In Kenya, Wananchi, under the Zuku brand, offers high-speed internet, fixed phone-line services and cable television. Cape Town-based Naspers’ Multichoice Africa offers digital satellite-television via its DStv unit.
Safaricom is developing its own platform to handle M-Pesa transactions at a cost of 25-billion Kenyan shillings ($291.3m ) that should be completed between April and September 2015, eliminating a 10% commission it now pays Vodafone, Mr Collymore said. Vodafone owns 40% of Safaricom. The new platform will double the speed of transactions to 600 per second with the ability to scale up, he said.
Half of all cellphone money-transfer payments done globally and about 99% in Kenya are processed through M-Pesa, with an average of 550 shillings per transaction, Mr Collymore said. M-Pesa moves the equivalent of 27% of the country’s $37bn gross domestic product, he said.
Bloomberg
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