Following years of isolationism and economic under-achievement, North Korea languishes near the bottom of the world’s telecom maturity index alongside Afghanistan and Turkmenistan (who also happen to be struggling under repressive political regimes).
Thailand’s telecom sector is relatively mature and hosts a mix of public and private sector players. The mobile market is highly developed and has experienced strong growth over the last seven years.
The return of the Taliban to power in August 2021 following the American-led withdrawal of security forces has thrown the telecom sector – along with the rest of Afghanistan’s developing economy – into disarray.
In spite of the telecom sector being one of the major contributors to Azerbaijan’s non-oil GDP, overall development, growth, and investment in the sector has been held back by years of political and civil unrest coupled with endemic corruption.
Guinea’s telecom market is dominated by MTN and Orange. After the entry of these regional players, the number of mobile subscribers grew strongly while revenue also increased steadily.
Mali’s topography includes large tracts of sparsely populated desert, with many settlements being hard to reach and thus rendering it difficult and expensive to provide effective fixed or mobile networks.
Telecom services in Madagascar have benefited from intensifying competition between the main operators, including Orange Madagascar, Airtel, and the incumbent telco Telma.
Zimbabwe’s telcos continue to be affected by the country’s poor economy. This has been exacerbated by the significant economic difficulties related to the pandemic.
Laos joined the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in 2013. One of the conditions of admittance was to establish an independent regulator for its telecom sector within two years.
The Kyrgyz Republic (more commonly known as Kyrgyzstan) has enjoyed relatively strong economic growth over the last decade – at least in terms of other Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries in Eastern Europe and Asia that formed following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
India’s telecommunications sector has struggled for growth over the last five years. The sector’s lacklustre performance has been in spite of concerted efforts by the government to bolster the underlying infrastructure in a bid to achieve universal coverage.
As part of a diverse range of initiatives designed to move the country from developing to developed status by 2025, Malaysia has enabled and encouraged open competition in its telecommunications market.
Mauritania’s small population and low economic output has limited the country’s ability to develop sustained growth in the telecom sector.
In recent years the government of Ivory Coast has helped develop a competitive telecom sector focussed on the provision of converged services, thus allowing operators to offer fixed-line and mobile services under a universal services licence regime.
Among African countries, Burundi provides an attractive telecom market given its high population density and existing low penetration rates for all services.
Rwanda was slow to liberalise the mobile sector, allowing MTN a monopoly until 2006 when the fixed-line incumbent, Rwandatel (since acquired by Liquid Intelligence Technologies) became the second mobile operator.
With few resources, Malawi is one of the world’s least developed countries. There has been little investment in fixed-line telecom infrastructure, and as a result, the country’s two mobile networks Airtel Malawi and TMN provide the vast majority of connections for voice and data services.
Tanzania’s telecom sector enjoys effective competition, particularly in the mobile segment. There remains considerable movement within the market, with Smart having stopped services in late 2019 and Tigo Tanzania having completed its merger with Zantel. Tigo Tanzania in April 2021 was sold by its parent company MIC as it sought to focus on its operations in Latin America.
Eswatini (or eSwatini) was one of the last countries in the world to open up its telecom market to competition. Until 2011 the state-owned Eswatini Posts and Telecommunications also acted as the industry regulator and had a stake in the country’s sole mobile network, in an uneasy partnership with MTN Eswatini.
The telecom sector in Mauritius has long been supported by the varied needs of tourists. This has stimulated the mobile market, leading to a particularly high penetration rate.
