By Brian Ngugi
| Oct. 11, 2023
Almost one million Kenyans have tapped smartphones placed on sale by Safaricom beneath its Sh20-a-day credit score plan within the yr to March this yr.
The revelation by Safaricom underlines the desire of Kenyans struggling to make ends meet to accumulate important items on credit score.
There was an upsurge within the utilization of “purchase now, pay later” companies, which permit customers to simply break up funds for purchases into instalments previously yr amid a deteriorating price of residing disaster.
Safaricom has since 2020 been providing smartphones on credit score to its subscribers who then make each day funds of as little as Sh20 for as much as a yr because the agency seeks to ramp up knowledge revenues.
The telco has partnered with American social media large Meta (previously referred to as Fb) on the inexpensive smartphone plan.
The plan has seen an uptake of 937,800 devices within the full yr ended March this yr, says Safaricom.
Uptake of smartphones
“Meta helps the Lipa Mdogo Mdogo (LMM) service, which goals to advertise the uptake of smartphones within the low-income market phase,” mentioned Safaricom.
“LMM presents inexpensive smartphones in instalments from as little as Sh20 each day, with over 900 000 prospects benefiting within the monetary yr 2023.”
Safaricom has set a goal of 1 million inexpensive smartphones, beneath the plan, in response to Chief Government Peter Ndegwa.
“We facilitated alternatives for (Safaricom) sellers to promote Lipa Mdogo Mdogo telephones,” mentioned Safaricom.
“The overall variety of telephones offered via Lipa Mdogo Mdogo was 937 800, of which 243,890 have been offered by sellers in monetary yr 2023.”
The plan was aimed toward changing about 4 million 2G and 3G-enabled telephones on Safaricom’s community to 4G.
The telco says it had 20.3 million smartphones on its community within the yr to March this yr, which was up from the 18.5 million smartphones in an identical interval final yr.
Out of all of the 20.3 million smartphones on its community within the interval, 13.2 have been 4G-enabled smartphones.
Safaricom has been searching for to rev up its knowledge enterprise to offset sluggish progress in cell calls, the place it has seen a small income progress as a result of saturation, forcing the agency to show to M-Pesa and the web to energy future progress.
The area’s most worthwhile telco is beneath strain to diversify its income streams from voice, quick message companies, money transfers and funds.
The telco, part-owned by South Africa’s Vodacom and Britain’s Vodafone, is eager to create new income streams as its voice enterprise matures.
Safaricom has consequently been searching for to capitalise on rising cell web use within the nation.
“Quite a lot of our customers are nonetheless on 2G and to some extent 3G gadgets. That’s the explanation we’re saying even if in case you have 4G protection… it is advisable begin bettering entry to gadgets,” mentioned Mr Ndegwa at a previous occasion.
“It’s an progressive manner of permitting prospects to get a tool that they might in any other case not be capable of afford. If in case you have an app, you may’t apply it to a 2G cellphone.”
Information is certainly one of Safaricom’s fastest-growing income strains, and the telco hopes that elevated smartphone utilization will increase the underside line.
Training or different makes use of
“We need to democratise the usage of knowledge, whether or not it’s for training or different makes use of,” mentioned Mr Ndegwa.
Safaricom revealed final yr it could goal residences and industrial workplaces in areas that aren’t presently served by its fibre community after it rolled out its new high-speed web.
The telco final yr launched Kenya’s first fifth-generation (5G) cell web companies commercially after a profitable pilot, making it the primary cell phone operator to supply the service in East Africa.
The 5G service is a central a part of Safaricom’s try and additional broaden its knowledge enterprise to counter slower progress in voice calls income.
bngugi@standardmedia.co.ke
