Africa’s telecom market has grown its international capacity consumption by an average compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 35% to 50% and can be expected to maintain this trajectory in years to come.
This is according to the chief executive officer of SEACOM, Mark Simpson, who says he anticipates strong growth in the African telecoms market this year.
Africa’s mobile market growth surge continued in 2013 as the GSMA has said that by mid-2013 there were 253 million unique mobile subscribers and 502 million connections.
SEACOM, in particular, operates a 17,000km Seacom subsea broadband cable that connects Africa’s eastern coastline to Europe and Southern Asia. But the company has also expanded its horizons by building the likes of data centres.
And Simpson notes that Africa’s strong international capacity demand is also thanks to government and operator investments into national fibre links, last-kilometre connectivity, and increased local content.
In a press statement, Simpson says there is scope for the industry to grow even faster if regulatory bottlenecks are addressed and with more investment on the continent.
“SEACOM expects to see more elements of the infrastructure ecosystem such as neutral, reliable data centres, active innovation hubs, open IX peering exchanges, cloud delivered ICT infrastructure and access networks come together during the coming years to catalyse the full potential of the market,” says the company in a statement.
Looking at its own operations, SEACOM says it plans to expand into more countries, including those on Africa’s West coast.
“During the past year, we have seen terrific progress. Our investments in West coast capacity, our African ring and meshed IP networks have started to come into their own – developments that have been really good for SEACOM’s customers. Terrestrial fibre penetration has also improved and we’re seeing continued and essential access network developments across our markets. These factors helped us to grow in 2013 and will continue to fuel our evolution in 2014,” says Simpson.
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