Kenya’s Communications Authority (CA) has reportedly removed several conditions linked to the sale of Yu Mobile to larger mobile rivals Airtel and Safaricom.
CA director general Francis Wangusi told local newspaper the Daily Nation that these…
Kenya’s Communications Authority (CA) has reportedly removed several conditions linked to the sale of Yu Mobile to larger mobile rivals Airtel and Safaricom.
CA director general Francis Wangusi told local newspaper the Daily Nation that these conditions were linked to infrastructure sharing but did not disclose exactly which four requirements, out of 13, have been removed.
The move is aimed at appeasing concerns from buyers Airtel and Safaricom, which had reportedly complained that some of the conditions were unrealistic.
In late March, the watchdog granted conditional approval to split Yu Mobile’s assets between its larger wireless competitors.
Airtel was given the green light to buy the minnow’s subscribers and GSM licences, while Safaricom received permission to snap up its network infrastructure on the condition that it shares its passive and active infrastructure with other licensed operators and service providers.
Safaricom, which is controlled by Vodafone, had reportedly been unhappy with the demand to open up its mobile phone-based money transfer and micro-financing service, known as M-Pesa, to rival MNOs and MVNOs. Meanwhile, Airtel was concerned about the timeline for the regulatory fee payment and whether it might need to sell one of its licences.
Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore later threatened to walk away from the deal.
The recent changes to the terms have been agreed with all three parties, Wangusi was quoted as saying at the weekend.
The regulator and operators were not immediately available to comment.
With mounting losses and a market share of only 9%, as opposed to 66.5% for Vodafone’s Safaricom and 18% for Airtel, Yu Mobile has been struggling to survive.
Early this year it was announced that Yu, which is majority-owned by Indian conglomerate Essar, would stop operating and that its assets would be split between the two market leaders.
Yu’s difficulties are not recent. Since it entered Kenya in 2008, its operations have been affected by an ongoing price war in the market.
The country’s fourth and smallest mobile player, Telkom Kenya, is also up for sale. Its parent, French incumbent Orange, launched a strategic review of the asset a few months back which could see it sell the operator or bring in a new partner.
The Kenyan market is expected to see further developments over the next few months as three MVNOs are set to make their debuts.
