Starlink’s big Africa problems

SpaceX’s rollout of its groundbreaking satellite Internet service is moving at a snail’s pace in Africa.

In many of the countries where it has launched, it is also struggling to keep up with demand because it offers much better performance and value for money than competing services.

Although Starlink rolled out to seven more countries on the continent during 2024 — doubling its footprint — it delayed 24 more countries’ estimated launch dates to 2025.

In addition, the launch timeframes of three northern African countries — Egypt, Morocco, and Western Sahara — were also changed from 2024 to “Unknown.”

Overall, Starlink only rolled out to 18% of the African countries where it had planned to launch in 2024.

The “Unknown” ETA will be all too familiar for locals eagerly awaiting Starlink’s official launch.

South Africa’s Starlink launch timeframe has been “Unknown” since late 2022, presumably due to its inability to meet historically disadvantaged ownership thresholds for telecoms licensees.

Fortunately, there was some progress in resolving these hangups during the year.

Communications minister Solly Malatsi met with Starlink’s regulatory team for Africa and subsequently issued a policy direction to the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) regarding equity equivalent programmes.

While he did not name Starlink specifically, the timing of the announcement strongly suggests that the call for these programmes was intended to ease the service’s approval process in South Africa.

“Equity equivalents, recognised in other sectors, provide an avenue for factoring in alternative ways for companies to make an impact on South Africa’s socioeconomic development,” Malatsi said.

“This will provide the certainty necessary to attract increased investment in ICT and accelerate universal Internet access.”

The company has also run into regulatory obstacles in other African countries, where it has faced resistance from government authorities, regulators, and local broadband players.

Overwhelming demand in launched countries

The seven new countries where Starlink launched in 2024 were Botswana, Burundi, Ghana, Madagascar, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, and Zimbabwe.

But even in those countries where Starlink has managed to roll out, things are not going as smoothly as planned.

Demand has been so high that the company has halted new sales in and around populated areas.

Unlike many more developed markets where Starlink previously launched, these countries have poorly developed infrastructure, even in urban environments.

Starlink may have underestimated demand for affordable Internet access in locations for which it does not yet have the necessary satellite capacity.

Subscribers have reported average speeds dropping from the triple digits to low double digits in cities like Harare, where users can no longer place orders.

At the time of publication, the service was also unavailable to order in and around Abuja, Accra, Benin City, Bulawayo, Lagos, Lusaka, Nairobi, and Port Harcourt.

The company has also suspended subscriptions for new roaming plans.

That came after it had already made it more difficult for existing South African roaming users to access the service by forcing them to return to the country of registration every 60 days.

The table below summarises Starlink’s current status or timeframes for rollouts across Africa.