Africa Now the World’s Second Largest Mobile Market

Africa is now the world’s second largest mobile market by connections after Asia, and the fastest growing mobile market in the world, according to the GSMA. Mobile penetration reached 649 million connections in the fourth quarter of 2011 (having first exceeded 50 per cent mobile penetration in 2010).

Over the past five years, the number of subscribers across Africa has grown by almost 20 per cent each year and will reach more than 735 million by the end of 2012. Africa Now the World’s Second Largest Mobile Market

Some 96 percent of subscriptions are pre-paid. By 2015, next-generation LTE networks are predicted to reach 500,000 connections in Kenya, 1.1 million connections in Nigeria and 2.5 million connections in South Africa.