Data now contributes 40 percent of TelOne revenue

Zimbabwe’s fixed line operator, TelOne, says it sees data services eventually becoming the major contributor to the company’s revenue after it invested heavily into overlay services.

Data now contributes over 40 percent of its total revenue, Telone’s Human Resources director Hopewell Zinyau said today.

The state owned company has plans to develop into a converged telecoms network offering enhanced data services above its traditional voice service.

TelOne plans to utilise a $98 million loan from China Exim Bank to finance the modernization and expansion of its entire fibre network.

“We are transforming the business in the face of dwindling voice revenues and broadband has been propped up as a key contributor to the revenue matrix,” Zinyau at the launch of the company’s new Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service.

“We have seen the contribution of data grow to the current levels of about 40 percent and we see that growing with the coming of $98 million loan facility.”

A quarterly report released by the Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (POTRAZ) yesterday showed that fixed telephone revenues declined by 7 percent from $30.6 million to $28.3 million in the quarter to June while investment in the sector increased by 8 percent to $1.7 million.

Total voice traffic across all sub-sectors declined by 5.2 percent from 1 257 842 811 minutes in the previous quarter to 1 192 571 970 minutes a development which POTRAZ attributed to the substitution of voice services with Over-the-Top services.-The Source

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