With a population of 15.9 million1 people and with over half of Malawians living below the poverty line, Malawi is one of the most densely populated and least developed countries in Africa. The country is located in the south east of the continent, landlocked and surrounded by Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique. Compared to the rest of Africa, the Malawi telecommunication market is particularly under-developed. There were 5.56 million mobile subscriptions at the end of 2013, giving a low penetration rate of 35%. Relatively low subscriber growth of 2.3% is forecast for 2014, and is expected to taper off over subsequent years. More than 99% of the subscribers are prepaid users. A SIM registration programme is taking place in 2014 and, as observed in other SSA countries, this is likely to have a negative impact on subscriber figures.

And a further 31,000 towers are currently for sale

Increasing comfort with the towerco business model and pipeline of opportunities attracts a deeper pool of investors

Agence Ecofin reports that Djezzy has launched 3.5G services in seven provinces of Algeria. Meanwhile, Algeria Telecom’s mobile arm, Mobilis, is rumoured to be extending its business-oriented fixed-wireless LTE service to consumers. TeleGeography’s CommsUpdate, report that Mobilis have already deployed 200 ‘eNodeB’ sites across the country, with plans to install 2,000 LTE-enabled base transceiver stations by year end 2015.

Orange’s experiences with infrastructure sharing, QoS and BTS in partnership with IHS in Cameroon and Cote d’Ivoire

Since inception NeXsysOne has been used at 200 projects, including Ooredoo’s ongoing rollout in Myanmar

IHS acquired or operates 90% of towers in Cameroon; Viettel launches 3G in September 2014

Ensuring all stakeholders share in the efficiencies created by active infrastructure sharing

How to prepare towers portfolios ready for sale – issues and pitfalls MNOs and towercos need to be aware of

How the investment criteria and return expectations vary from early stage VC to later, larger investments in emerging market towers

AST manage almost 3,000 remote cell sites in India, and are seeking to expand into Africa and Southeast Asia

The criticality of local knowledge and local relationships in tapping a diverse range of opportunities in the MENASA regions