Remote working boosts data uptake

The coronavirus pandemic that has restricted some employees to work from home with business meetings now mostly held from remote locations helped the telecoms sector record growth in both active internet subscription and penetration for the three months to September 2020.

Latest figures from regulator Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (Potraz), show that

active internet and data subscriptions grew by 5.6 percent to reach 8,726,904 from 8,267,268.

This resulted in the internet penetration rate increasing by 3.2 percent to reach 59.9 percent from 56.7 percent recorded in the previous quarter.

Mobile internet was the biggest beneficiary of the shift to online platforms with mobile internet and data traffic growing by 43 percent to record 14,878TB in the third quarter of 2020 from 10,407TB recorded in the second quarter of 2020.

Used International Internet Bandwidth Capacity also increased by 16.8 percent to record 149,665Mbps from 128,173Mbps recorded in the previous quarter.

Mobile voice calls also registered significant growth as total mobile voice traffic increased by 18.7 percent to record 1.56 billion minutes during the period under review.

Voice service is still the biggest contributor to the bottom line of mobile operators, according to Potraz.

Though the number of fixed telephone line declined by 1.6 percent to 256 356, total fixed voice traffic increased by 12 percent to record 90.6 million minutes in the third quarter of 2020 from 80.9 million minutes recorded in the second quarter of 2020.

Going forward, Potraz said the current levels of market, concentration are expected to remain, with Econet and Liquid maintaining dominance of the mobile and Internet Access Provider markets respectively.

“There will be continued momentum around innovation in non-traditional business models such as Internet of Things applications in order to tap into new revenue streams.”-ebusinessweekly.co.zw