Kenya mobile subscriptions hit 51 million

Mobile subscriptions in Kenya have hit 51 million after mobile operators listed 1.5 million new active subscriptions in the three months ending March 2019, according to the latest quarterly report by the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA).

The net additions represent a 3.1 per cent increase from 49.5 million with mobile penetration rising to 106.8 per cent due to increase in SIM card ownership as customers look to get offers from a variety of providers.

In the quarter Airtel Networks Limited’s market went up by 2.7 per centage points to stand at 26.1 per cent while Safaricom PLC’s share shrunk marginally from 63.3 percent to 62.4.

Telkom Kenya also dropped from 9.0 to 7.9 per cent even as Finserve Africa Limited shed 0.8 per centage points to stand at 3.4 per cent. Mobile Pay remained unchanged from last quarter at 0.2 per cent.

“The Jan-March 2019 quarter sector report also shows a 1.4 per cent increase in the number of active mobile money subscriptions to 32 million up from 31.6 million. The period registered 564.8 million mobile money transfer transactions valued at KSh.2.1 trillion. Additionally, in mobile commerce, there were 571.5 million transactions valued at KSh. 1.84 trillion. Person-to-person transfers were valued at KSh. 737 billion,” according to the report summary.

Data subscriptions went up by 2.5 per cent to stand at 46.8 million while free-to-air television channels increased to 81 up from 75 registered in the preceding quarter while radio FM stations remained unchanged at 173.

According to the report, during the quarter, the National Kenya Computer Incident Response Team (National KE-CIRT) detected 11.2 million cyber threats, up from 10.2 million and 14,078 cyber threat advisories were issued to the affected organizations, an increase from the 12,138 advisories issued during the previous period.

The postal/courier sub-sector saw a drop in its numbers to a total of 716,193 items sent down from 1.1 million the previous quarter.

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