Telecoms in South Africa

South Africa has a first-world telecom network in the commercial centres, but very low penetration of services in rural and remote areas. The country has over 14 million mobile phone and almost five million fixed line subscribers. Until recently, Telkom was the only licensed provider of public switched telecommunications services.

The fixed-line monopoly of Telkom, a listed company in which the government is the largest shareholder, expired with the licensing of Neotel as the second national operator.

Cellular services are currently provided by three licensed operators: Vodacom, MTN (Mobile Telephone Network) and Cell C.

22 percent of South African adults have a land line at home, and 41 percent have access to a cell phone. In 1996 the corresponding figures were 30percent and 2.4percent.

A little over 70 percent of cell phone users do not have a land line at home, up from 65 percent in 2003.