Business booming for mobile phone companies

Revenue generated by Zimbabwe’s mobile network operators revenue grew nine percent to $247 million in the three months to September last year compared to the previous quarter, a regulator’s report has shown.

The Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (POTRAZ) said in its 2014 third quarter Sector Performance Report that total investment was over 53 percent higher at $46 million from $30 million recorded in the second quarter of 2014.

During the period under review there were 75 additional 2G base stations to 3 284 while the telcos added 40 more 3G base stations to 1 300. There were two additional LTE base stations, by Econet, during the period.

Subscribers using mobile money transfer services rose by 16.3 percent to reach 4.9 million from 4.2 million in the previous quarter. The total value of transfers and transactions on mobile money services increased by 35.8 percent to $403.2 million from $296.8 million recorded in the previous quarter.

“The total number of active mobile subscribers increased by 2.6 percent to reach 11.4 million from 11.1 million subscribers recorded in the previous quarter,” POTRAZ said in the report.

“Internet penetration rate increased by 0.5 percent to reach 47.5 percent from 47 percent recorded in the previous quarter.”

Telecel’s active subscribers fell by 2.1 percent to 2.2 million while state-owned NetOne registered the largest increase of 13.8 percent to 2.7 million. Econet’s subscriber base grew by 2.1 percent to 6.4 million.

The number of items sent locally declined by 25.8 percent to record 2.6 million items from 3.6 million items recorded in the previous quarter. Local courier items also declined by 14.6 percent to record 224 783 items from 286 584 items recorded in the previous quarter.

International incoming courier and international outgoing postal and courier declined by 13.7 percent and 1.9 percent respectively.

POTRAZ blamed the slowdown in economic activity for the frail performance of the postal and courier services sector.-The Source

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