Starlink gains 0.5pc of Kenya’s internet market in first year
- by Business Daily Africa
- Oct 14, 2024
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The Starlink logo is seen on a mobile device.Â
Photo credit: Wananchi Group Limited (Zuku), on the other hand, saw its market control shrink during the period to 17.5 percent from 21.6 percent last year.
âSafaricom Plc reported the largest market share of 36.4 percent followed by Jamii Telecommunications Ltd and Wananchi Group at 24.0 and 17.5 percent respectively. Starlink Internet Services Kenya, which was licensed earlier in the financial year to provide satellite internet services, had a market share of 0.5 percent as of June 30, 2024,â wrote CA in its latest sector statistics report.
Starlink, which is an outgrowth of Muskâs space technology firm SpaceX, operationalised services within the local market in late July last year, setting the stage for what analysts termed âa consequential industry disruptionâ that would see the battle for the fast-expanding market intensify among the top ISPs.
Satellite internet users
Between April and June this year, CA notes, Kenyaâs utilised satellite internet capacity - which reflects the total internet access speed that the technology can provide per second - increased rapidly to 840.448 gigabits per second (Gbps) up from 48.438 Gbps in the previous quarter, a more than 16-fold jump, courtesy of Starlink services uptake in the country.
âSatellite subscriptions maintained an upward trend following the launch of Starlink services during the year, with 96.9 percent of satellite customers subscribed to speeds between 100 Mbps and 1 Gbps,â notes the industry regulator.
The overall satellite internet subscriptions in the country grew monumentally during the year from 405 as of June last year to 8,324 at the end of the review period.
âThis growth is attributed to the licensing and subsequent launch of Starlink Internet Services Kenya earlier in the financial year,â said CA.
âThis trend is expected to continue in the coming periods considering that this technology provides high-speed, low-latency broadband connectivity, especially in areas where internet is currently unavailable or unreliable.â
The disclosures by the regulator point to a growing appetite among users for more personalised attention and quality services, with market disruption already taking shape as traditional players start exhibiting distress signs.
In August this year, market leader Safaricom wrote a letter of protest letter to the CA asking it to review the policy of licensing independent ISPs in what was widely seen as an attempt to censor Starlink.
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