Business

The number mobile phone subscribers in Rwanda has now shoot up by 3.02 per cent to 4,759,310 in the month of June up from 4,619,429 in the month of May, figures released on Friday by industry regular, Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Agency (RURA) indicate.

 The figure which is almost half of the country’s total population is expected to shoot up sharply to 6 million by December this year, according to the regulator projections. 

New kid on the block, Airtel, has come out to register more subscribers than its competitors, adding 54,904 users in the month of June to 110,304 up from 55,400 the previous month.

“The increase is normal and it is justified by the coming in of a new player (Airtel).However, according to the recent increases, I believe we won’t make the 6 million target by December--- may be if Airtel does something special to increase its customer base,” Head of Communication at RURA, Jean Baptist Mutabazi, noted in a telephone interview.

The data further indicates that the sector giant (MTN Rwanda) attracted 46,208 hitting a mark of 3,033,421 users in June up from 2,987,213 the previous month.

Tigo, which is owned by Luxembourg-based Millicom International Cellular SA (MICC), attracted 38,769 users from 1,576,816 subscribers in May to 1,615,585 million in June.

The country’s mobile penetration increased by 1.4 percentage points to 44.4 per cent from 43 per cent in May---the figure is still the lowest in the region after Burundi. The country targets 60 per cent penetration by the end of this year.