{"id":547840,"date":"2006-01-26T06:18:03","date_gmt":"2006-01-26T06:18:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wordpress\/technology\/547840-sa-operators-top-44m-mobile-subscribers.html"},"modified":"2006-01-26T06:18:03","modified_gmt":"2006-01-26T06:18:03","slug":"sa-operators-top-44m-mobile-subscribers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/547840-sa-operators-top-44m-mobile-subscribers.html","title":{"rendered":"SA operators top 44m mobile subscribers"},"content":{"rendered":"

SA’s mobile operators are growing subscriber numbers, collectively racking up 44 million subscribers. <\/font><\/p>\n

This figure is expected to increase once MTN and Cell C release updated subscriber numbers. <\/font><\/p>\n

The Vodacom Group said yesterday it had recorded 21.5 million subscribers as at 31 December 2005, reflecting a 12.4% increase in the three months since 30 September. <\/font><\/p>\n

Vodacom attributes the strong growth to high gross customer connections of 3.4 million combined with low churn for the quarter. <\/font><\/p>\n

Within its South African operations, the group increased its subscriber base from 15.7 million to 17.6 million, showing an 11.6% growth in that quarter. The greatest growth in SA was within the postpaid market, which grew 12.2% from 13.6 million to 15.3 million. The postpaid contract subscriber base showed a marginal increase from just over 2 million to 2.3 million. <\/font><\/p>\n

?It should be noted that while Vodacom has added roughly 1.8 million subscribers over the last three months, the fact is that their average revenue per user has once again dropped,? says Richard Hurst, a BMI-TechKnowledge analyst. <\/font><\/p>\n

MTN could not disclose its subscriber numbers as the company is in a closed period. It will release subscriber numbers for the year ended 31 December at its annual results briefing on 23 March. <\/font><\/p>\n

However, the group previously announced it had over 20 million subscribers as at 30 September. The group acquired 1.036 million subscribers during the festive season, with MTN South Africa signing up its 10 millionth customer on 16 December. <\/font><\/p>\n

Hurst says MTN’s subscriber growth across Africa is a healthy mixture of both acquisition and organic growth of subscribers. <\/font><\/p>\n

?The fact is that there is a massive demand for basic voice services in Africa and while the acquisition strategies will give an almost immediate boost of subscribers in the medium- to long-term, these acquisitions should translate to healthy subscriber figures and growth for MTN,? he says. <\/font><\/p>\n

Cell C spokesperson Happy Zondi says the company will provide updated subscriber figures at a later stage. The company previously claimed 2.7 million subscribers. <\/font><\/p>\n

INet-Bridge<\/i>\u00a0<\/font><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SA’s mobile operators are growing subscriber numbers, collectively racking up 44 million subscribers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-547840","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547840"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547840\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}