Pyramid Research expects South Africa's mobile data revenue to surpass the $5 billion mark by 2018.

This has been revealed in its "South Africa Intelligence Report", which is an analysis on market trends, regulatory environments, competitive dynamics, and competitive analysis on fixed and mobile sectors in the country.

According to the report, over the next few years significant growth in the country's telecoms market should occur in the mobile data and fixed Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services.

Growth of mobile data revenue in the next four years is expected to almost double to $5 billion compared to the 2011 figure of $2.8 billion, it was stated in the report.

The rise of VoIP will be similarly strong and can be credited to new offers for businesses, principally targeting the small and mid-size enterprise (SME) segment.

“We expect revenue from these services to grow at an impressive Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 29% from $46 million in 2013 to $160 million in 2018,” the report reads.

Co-author and analyst at Pyramid Research, Ousmane Yatera, explained that undersea cable projects like the West African Cable System (WACS), and the upcoming BRICS and ACE cables are expected to double South Africa’s broadband capacity.

Yatera noted that projects such as these have the potential to strengthen the country’s data backbone and therefore improve the offering of broadband internet and data-related services.

"South Africa has begun initiatives to invest in technology and infrastructure," he said,

He added, “Equally, operators are now looking to expand their 3G and 4G networks all over the country.”

The report further projects that the southern African nation's telecom market revenue is set to grow at a CAGR of 2% over the forecast period, from estimated $14.4 billion in 2013 to $16.1 billion in 2018.

It was also stated that as aggressive mobile price wars continue in the country this could lead voice revenue to decline at a compound rate of 2% over the forecast period.