Pan-African telecommunications service provider Seacom is acquiring, for an undisclosed amount, selected infrastructure assets from Africell in Uganda to further expand its East African footprint.
This followed the company’s recent acquisition of Kenyan service provider Hirani Telecom's metropolitan fibre network.
“East Africa has been an important market for Seacom ever since we first arrived on the shores of Mombasa in 2009,” explained Seacom East and North-East Africa MD and regional head of sales Tejpal Bedi.
“By officially establishing ourselves in Uganda through proprietary facilities and resources, we are prioritising widespread connectivity and opening up opportunities to work with businesses in search of quality Internet services.”
In line with Seacom’s five-year strategy to expand operations in the region, the acquisition will provide the company, which has provided wholesale solutions to Uganda since its inception in 2009 and corporate solutions since 2018, a greater local presence.
Through the new transaction, Seacom will take over a comprehensive portfolio of infrastructure essential for connecting enterprise customers, including 760 km of fibre within the Ugandan capital city of Kampala and surrounding towns, a 250 m2 data centre and office space for Seacom representatives and staff members.
The service provider has a large footprint in Uganda’s financial services sector and works with government and non-governmental organisations, including those in the education, technology and hospitality sectors.
According to Bedi, while Uganda is dominated by small businesses, it is home to a thriving private sector with thousands of medium to large-sized businesses located primarily across Kampala and the central region.
“There is also a growing Internet penetration rate with competitive connectivity prices compared with other countries in the region,” said Bedi, noting that the further expansion into East Africa and the acquisition of established infrastructure will enable Seacom to provide seamless integration of its services for clients across Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania.
It will also decrease the reliance on third-party last-mile providers to deliver connectivity solutions, including wireless and fibre Internet access and cloud connectivity, as well as hosting facilities, such as email, and security, such as distributed denial of service protection software.
“Seacom is responding to the needs of the market. Customers are starting to buy more bandwidth. Businesses are making use of the cloud like never before, using enterprise resource planning, Office 365 and customer relationship management solutions that serve not just to fill gaps, but aid in driving digital transformation and strengthening internal and external capabilities,” he concluded.