Fixed line incumbent Telkom launched its mobile business in October 2010 and was privatized in 2013. Telkom’s turnaround strategy remains on track, and its share price has better than doubled in the last twelve months. Telkom has just over 2mn mobile subscribers, representing 2% market share, and is in the early stages of rolling out LTE-Advanced.
While Telkom’s passive infrastructure sale process is of interest in it’s own right, of even greater interest could be the implications of a Telkom sale for South Africa’s other operators, particularly MTN. MTN had been discussing a network agreement with Telkom (discussions believed to be ongoing), while MTN had been on the brink of selling their own ~6,000 towers to American Tower in 2013, before ultimately stepping back from the deal.
