Safaricom beats Airtel in new customer subscriptions

Giant telco Safaricom has re-asserted itself as the supreme operator outpacing arch rival Airtel in growing its customer base between April and June this year.

The disclosure contained in the Communications Authority (CA) quarterly statistical bulletin on gross customer subscriptions ends Safaricom’s bleeding of its gigantic market share to rival Airtel in recent months.

From the resulting gain on its closest competitor, Safaricom now commands a greater 63.5 percent share of the market having registered new customer additions to hit 33.1 million subscriptions from 31.8 million subscribers in March.

Airtel has meanwhile seen its first regression in the growth of its customer base in as many months shedding off 479,419 subscribers in the three months to June.

Meanwhile, Safaricom’s co-rival Telkom kept up its unpredictable stance on customer growth with new subscriptions peaking at 4.5 percent in the quarter to hit 4.2 million subscribers in the period.

Airtel and Telkom, who remain the subject of an ongoing merger, still hold the potential to stage an upset on the leading telecoms operator in spite of registering a mixed performance in the growth of their differentiated consumer bases in the review period.

However, the outfits have seen their combined market share fall marginally to 32.7 percent on the back of a slash on the operator’s subscriptions to 16.95 million customers.

The pairing of Airtel and Telkom has however grown their combined share of voice traffic to a combined 43 percent against a retreating portion by the market leader which peaked at 56.8 percent.