Kenyans scale back on new SIM cards acquisitions

TELECOMMUNICATION:  Local fixed telephone network traffic increased in the third quarter of last year despite a general decline in the fixed telephone service sector, a report has revealed. 

This comes at a time when Kenya’s mobile telephony market has reached saturation in terms of SIM card uptake, hence, can barely accommodate more cards. 

A recent report by the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) shows that local fixed network traffic increased by 4.4 per cent during the period despite the number of fixed line subscriptions, fixed wireless and fixed Voice Over Internet Protocol (Voip) subscriptions declining. 

“Total local fixed network traffic increased by 4.4 per cent during the period under review to post 593,724 minutes, from 568,924 minutes reported in the previous quarter. On the contrary, fixed VoIP traffic dropped to 182,472 minutes from 214,473 minutes recorded in the previous quarter,” the report says.

Declining subscriptions

Fixed line subscriptions declined by 3.2 per cent to stand at 21,019 from to 21,708 in June the same year. Fixed wireless subscriptions declined 2.2 per cent to 1,049 while fixed VoIP subscriptions declined 4.3 per cent to 44,164.

That the Kenyan market has reached saturation and hence can barely accommodate new cards, is evident as of September, there were  53.2 million active SIM cards against a population of about 48 million.