Providers now look to new technology

Orange Telecom is meanwhile, marching to a different tune entirely. Even though the network is seeing more usage, network quality, according to their chief strategist, has not been affected.

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This is most likely because new customer migration to the network has not been as intense as the competition, leaving the network free to accommodate the Gyekiri tariff. 

Orange Uganda's Gyekiri offers free on-net calls for up to five days, depending on the scratch card value, every time a customer loads airtime.

Because there is no charge on calls within the network, the customer is free to use his credit for calls outside the network.

"We are adopting a holistic pricing strategy which enables our customers to use other Orange services such as data, sms and voicemail, and make cheaper international and off-net calls," said Edouard Blondeau, Orange's chief officer.

At 32 per cent national penetration, there is still a lot of room for expansion in voice. Unfortunately, creativity eludes the operators at present.

Warid's Ush100 scratch card, meant to "empower bottom pyramid consumers," was not quite so innovative, especially considering that the competition had already been offering e-top up for as low asUsh50.

The environmental cost of printing the scratch card comes into question, weighed against the presumed benefits.

Growing demand

The operators have to keep feeding the beast of consumer demand and with call rates whittled down to the barest minimum, the question moves away from pricing to value addition and quality of service.

"The market as it stands cannot accommodate more advanced technologies. The technologically advanced market is already on the networks and the target low-end consumers are not sophisticated enough to make use of new innovations," said Mr Ssemanda, cautioning operators against providing services that would be incongruous for the Ugandan market, in the form of competition.

Orange telecom is preparing to rollout mobile TV by mid next year but the network has no plans to engage in a sort of triple play offering where data, voice and TV products are all bundled into one package.

"The capital outlay required to lay copper infrastructure for such an undertaking would be too massive to easily recoup. Uganda's hilly landscape presents some difficulties as well, not to mention the fact that we have already committed to a huge project in laying fibre cables," Mr Blondeau says.

Instead, consumers can look forward to video calls and improved services on the Orange 3G+ network.

Source: Breaking News, Kenya