Mobile subscription penetration - Among West African countries, Senegal is one of the more mature markets in terms of mobile subscription penetration, which stood at 88 percent at year-end 2012 and is expected to reach 105 percent by 2017, according to a new report from Pyramid Research.
However, with 11.4 million mobile subscriptions at the end of 2012, Senegal’s market is one of the smallest in the region in terms of mobile revenue, at US$ 906 million in 2012.
This is mainly due to its comparatively small population of about 13.1 million people in 2012.
The report notes that in January 2013, the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE) submarine cable was landed in the West African country, providing more capacity to meet the growing demand for voice and data and creating opportunities for all operators to provide superior products and services to Senegalese end users.
'Pyramid Research projects that broadband Internet will generate US$ 123 million by 2017, more than double the US$ 59 million generated in 2012, driven by the ACE cable and the introduction of the Globacom-1 underwater cable from Nigerian operator Globacom,' said Pyramid Research analyst, Ousmane Yatera.
Orange Senegal has a stake in the ACE cable, and it will leverage this extra broadband capacity.
“Pyramid Research believes that the investments of Orange Senegal and Sudatel in the ACE submarine cable, accompanied by an existing infrastructure to act as a launching pad, will spread adoption among new households,” Yategra added.
From 2012-2017 total revenue is expected to increase to US$ 1.9 billion in 2017, a CAGR (compound annual growth rate) of 4 percent, mainly because of the rise in mobile penetration and increased pricing competition among the three mobile network operators.
By comparison, Nigeria stood at US$ 8.8 billion in total telecom service revenue in 2012, but the market size will only grow at a 1 percent CAGR over the next five years.
“We expect Cameroon to have the greatest rate of revenue growth in the region, with a CAGR of 7 percent, to reach a total telecom service revenue of US$ 1.7 billion in 2017,” said Pyramid Research in its ‘Senegal: Undersea Cables Drive Broadband Growth & Create Operator Opportunities’ report.
The report offers a precise profile of the country's telecommunications, media and technology sectors based on proprietary data from Pyramid's research in the market.
In addition, it provides a detailed competitive analysis of both the fixed and mobile sectors, tracks the market shares of technologies and services and monitors the introduction and spread of new technologies.
Pana 13/03/2013