South Africa's Telkom Applies for Mobile License

South Africa's dominant landline provider, Telkom is reported to have requested permission from the regulator to set up its own wholy owned mobile phone network. The company is currently a 50% shareholder in the country's largest mobile operator, Vodacom along with Vodafone - but is generally accepted to be looking at a sale of its holding.

As Vodacom operates in several countries, a sale by Telkom should release enough cash to build its own network in the country. The rationale for a sale and then rebuilding a new network seems that Vodacom is itself starting to make inroads into the landline market, and Telkom would find it easier to offer fixed-mobile converged services if it had control of its own mobile network.

Unnamed sources have told the local ITWeb publication that the company has applied for spectrum in the 1800MHz band from the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA).

Telkom refused to comment on the matter, and would only reiterate it is conducting a review of its mobile strategy. "This review is not complete and Telkom will provide more information to the market when we are ready to do so," says Nabintu Petsana, acting group executive for corporate communications.

The country's newest operator, Cell C has struggled to make headway in the market dominated by long-term incumbents, Vodacom and MTN. Telkom may have an easier ride though as it would have the backing of its landline operations and could bundle the services together to compete on price with the incumbents.

On the web: ITWeb

Posted to the site on 18th February 2008