Safaricom has partnered with Showmax to offer home fibre customers one month complimentary unlimited access to the streaming service.

According to the telco, all home customers will automatically receive a link to the service once they renew their subscription through M-Pesa between 24 March and 15 May 2019.

The link will facilitate connectivity with up to five devices and enable streaming from two devices simultaneously.

Safaricom claims its home fibre service now reaches more than 200,000 homes across the country including Nairobi, Thika, Nakuru, Mombasa, Kisumu, Naivasha, Kericho, Nyeri, Embu, Meru, Bungoma, Kakamega, Eldoret, Kitale and Nanyuki.

Customers can further extend the validity of their subscription to the service for KES 250 per month by dialling *400*3# and selecting the Showmax option.

Sylvia Mulinge, Chief Customer Officer, Safaricom, said, "We are glad to partner with Showmax to bring a whole world of fun and entertainment to our customers. Our fibre service has continued to record strong demand to connect more homes as more families seek to take advantage of the different possibilities, from a wide selection of entertainment options, home security, to the ability to comfortably work from home. We remain keen on such partnerships in an effort to meet this demand."

In February 2019 Safaricom announced plans to upgrade its backbone network and leverage Huawei's end-to-end 400G solution and replace its existing 100G backbone. This would increase the capacity of network traffic carried between Mombasa, Nairobi and Kisumu.

ITWeb reported that Safaricom seeks to meet growing data needs due to the expansion of its fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) and enterprise fibre networks. The firm has also been experiencing a year-on-year doubling of mobile data usage on its network.

"It's about long term investment into the capacity of the network. As people increase their use of digital products in their lifestyle. they need higher speeds and better latencies," said Safaricom CTO Thibaud Rerolle.