Six months after rebranding, Vodafone’s South African affiliate, Vodacom, has turned in what Frost & Sullivan described as “a solid set” of financial results for the six months to the end of September, with total group revenue rising to R31.7bn (€2.9bn) from R29.5bn. Mobile data revenue was up 31.1 per cent year on year and EBITDA 7.6 per cent higher to R10.5bn on the back of a 38 per cent growth in data customers. Yet subsidiary Gateway Communications continued to drag on the company’s operating profit with an R318m impairment charge over the period.

Vodacom, the pan-African subsidiary of Vodafone, is reducing connection speeds for some of its BlackBerry users in South Africa “from 3G to 2G levels”. The company said that it studied the usage patterns of its customers to better understand the causes of congestion at peak times and found that more than 95 per cent of BlackBerry data usage was attributable to less than 5 per cent of users.

A high capacity submarine cable system linking southern Africa with Europe landed at its final destination in Cape Town this morning. The West African Cable System (WACS), a 14,000km, 5.1Tbps system was brought ashore at Yzerfontein in the Western Cape and will both complement and compete with the 340Gbps Sat-3 system that went into service in the region in 2002.

The construction phase of the West African Cable System (WACS) is due for completion early in April, when the cable will reach its final destination point at Yzerfontein in South Africa. The cable was slated to be ready for commercial use by the third quarter of this year, but that target has now been pushed back to early 2012.

Vodacom group has sold its remaining 24.9 per cent stake in WiMAX service provider WBS, which operates under the iBurst brand.Vodacom intends to bid for 2.6GHz and 3.5Ghz spectrum, when it is made available, but the South African regulator specified that current 2.6Ghz spectrum holders such as WBS and therefore Vodacom may not qualify.

Far-reaching regulatory changes look set to heat up broadband competition in South Africa. How far this will improve WiMAX prospects remains less certain, particularly as the debate about how to allocate 2.6GHz and 3.5GHz licences is proving to be divisive and prolonged. Yet South Africa’s telecom landscape is undergoing seismic change.

UK-based operator Vodafone said Thursday that its Rand22.5bn ($2.5bn) bid for a further 15 per cent stake in South African operation Vodacom has been accepted. The move takes Vodafone’s holding in Vodacom to 65 per cent, and allows the Big V to realise its long standing aim of taking control of the African operator. Vodacom [...]

South African operator Vodacom said Friday it has agreed to acquire most of the assets of pan-African carrier services and satellite firm Gateway Telecommunications. Vodacom, which is a 50/50 joint venture between Vodafone and local carrier Telkom, is to pay approximately $675m for the firm. The broadcasting businesses held by Gateway are not part of [...]

A group of mobile operators announced a substantial investment drive in the continent’s sub-Saharan region on Monday. The GSM Association revealed that a group of carriers including MTN, Orange, Vodacom and Kuwaiti carrier Zain are to plough more than $50bn into the region over the next five years in a bid to extend mobile coverage [...]