Who will use W-CDMA?
Data services are still largely based on SMS in Africa (almost exclusively so outside South Africa). Although SMS does not constitute a large share of company revenues, Mauritius is an advanced market on a regional level, suggesting there could be an appetite for more advanced data services supported by 3G technology. For example, Cellplus, which had 326,000 subscribers in December 2003, recorded some 300 million text messages sent across its network, while 277.94 million SMS were sent on Safaricom Kenya’s network and 15.3 million on MTN Cameroon’s – this despite the fact that the two operators are both bigger than Cellplus and had 1.38 million and 538,000 customers respectively at the end of 2003. In addition to their local subscriber bases, operators in Mauritius can count on visitors (largely tourists) to the country to generate both voice and data roaming revenue. In addition they may soon be able to benefit from the government’s plan to transform Mauritius into a ‘cyber-island’ ma
