The number of mobile subscribers in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and East African Community (EAC) regions will grow to 55 million by 2009, says African ICT analyst firm BMI-TechKnowledge.
There are currently around 30 million mobile users in the regions.
Brian Neilson, research director at BMI-T, says although SA has the most subscribers, it is expected that in future, an equal amount of new investment in telecoms infrastructure will come from other southern African countries.
Neilson says SA alone has about 22 million mobile subscribers. By 2009, this could increase to around 30 million to 35 million subscribers, if one counts gross subscriber numbers.
He says the EAC region, which includes Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, has a relatively untapped telecommunications market, giving it the next largest mobile sector growth potential after SA.
"With the mobile sector showing a massive growth rate, consulting companies, equipment vendors and operators have begun to seek new ways to grow the telecoms sector in the SADC/EAC regions.
"Through a range of commercial and technology solutions, backbone projects, especially wireless communication, operators and vendors alike have been driven to seek new ways to address telecoms needs in the SADC/EAC regions."
Neilson adds that fixed-line and Internet connectivity uptake has been disappointing, but fixed wireless access technology has the potential of re-igniting the fixed-line market in the region.
He concludes that with the second national operator coming into play in SA, there could be an even greater emphasis on rolling out fixed wireless infrastructure.
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