The number of operators in South Africa’s already competitive mobile market could yet increase – and the market leader Vodacom has stated its opinion that this could be damaging to the market in the long term...

The number of operators in South Africa’s already competitive mobile market could yet increase – and the market leader Vodacom has stated its opinion that this could be damaging to the market in the long term.

Chris Ross, managing executive for commercial deployment at Vodacom, stated: “Ultimately it needs to have a commercial viability and I think if you look in the data world, in the fixed line space there’s a proliferation of little organisations that are out selling internet and so on and it’s not always good for the industry when you have too much competition at very different levels.”

While the market currently has four operators – MTN, Cell C, Vodacom and 8ta, operated by Telkom – Ross observed that new players could enter the fold following the likely auction of LTE spectrum in South Africa next year. He did add that "competition [is] driving pricing down", an advantage for subscribers.

In addition, Ross noted that the mobile broadband market had attracted from outside the mobile arena, saying “we compete now for the same target audience as the fixed line providers.” Having pioneered 3G services in South Africa, Vodacom is pushing mobile data, with HSPA now used by 10% of its customers. “The only computer experience that many South Africans will have is in that mobile device that they have in their hands. Having data access has been absolutely critical,” said Ross.